The Eve of the Night
by E.V. Oleander
Summary: Bruce is forced to question his solitary existence with a shadow and a circus boy.
1. Chapter 1

"Shouldn't you be a bit more upbeat, Master Wayne?" Alfred looked on as Bruce fastened a cufflink together. "I thought it was the top priority of Bruce Wayne to go to these types of events."

"Do you always feel a need to make things more difficult than they are?" Not amused, Bruce only glanced halfway up towards the elder man, still trying to get the damn thing in its slot.

"Oh I don't feel a need sir," He assured, silently keeping count of the time it took for his young master to successfully dress. "You make it plenty difficult for yourself."

"Have you found any leads on the O'Hara case?" Finally! Rolling his eyes at himself at how long it took, Bruce went to grab his suit jacket but found Alfred already holding it out for him.

"Three. However, they seem to have adequate alibis." Hefting the material onto Bruce' shoulders, Alfred backed away. "But I have found a few pseudonyms for your girlfriend."

"Which one?" Taking off towards the front door where the car would be waiting for him, Bruce adjusted his sleeve to fit him better.

"The only one that you seem even remotely interested in at the moment." Alfred told him. "It seems the others were tired of you not showing interest."

"Are any of them reliable?" This woman had been a pain since the moment she arrived on the scene. He couldn't decide exactly what her priorities were as she stole from various people, all wealthy and pains themselves, but she also had a tendency for the bejeweled items as well. Not to mention there were a couple deaths but he was uncertain as to what had caused them.

"None sir." Alfred followed to the very last moment. "I'm not sure any of them would catch your fancy as of late considering you have done nothing but sitting in that damn cave for the past nine months."

"Would you rather me be a philanderer again?" He questioned, not bothering to slow down as they almost arrived at the front door.

"I would rather you find something worth living for other than Batman." Alfred told him frankly. "We both loved and cared for Ms. Dawes but..."

"We'll talk about this later." Brushing him off, Bruce hurried down the steps of the manor and to the awaiting car.

"Of course." Alfred nodded, knowing that he would not be able to ease the man's pain but also aware of the fact that the path that Bruce Wayne was headed was a dark and ultimately lonely one. He had seen people go down this path before and for the boy that he had a hand in raising, Alfred would not stand by ideally and let it happen.

"Alfred." Bruce called to the man, before getting in the overly priced car. "Upload the names into the phone and some of the profiles that you have on these women."

"Would you like their phone numbers as well?" Perhaps he was making it too apparent that he did not want to drive home another woman as she droned on about how wonderful their night was and asking him if Bruce would call the next day.

"I can get those myself." The utter cockiness in his voice was enough to make Alfred blanch but when he saw the smile that meant Bruce was joking, he felt a bit more relaxed.

"Very good sir." Alfred agreed, going back into the large house as the engine roared to life and drove away, leaving Alfred once again, alone and having to tend to another task to the darker half of his young charge.

* * *

"Bruce!" Bruce turned his head, arriving in the club and saw his friend, Thomas Elliot coming to greet him through all the blaring music and ongoing lights. Plus all the bodies all around the high-end gentleman's club, which to Bruce always seemed like an oxymoron. Engulfing him in a hug, Bruce back away hoping that the smile on his face was just fake enough. "I'm glad you could make it."

"I'm surprised Ronnie is letting you do this." Bruce chuckled. "I thought she was going to place an embargo on the whole wedding if you threw one of these."

"No touching." Thomas shrugged. "That was the deal."

"Understandable." He nodded, taking in the place in general. There were women dancing, serving, and gracing men with their presences. The men sitting back and letting them do such things, not caring about their names, backgrounds or anything that would make them a person. It made him sick, this practice of letting people become nothing more than objects to be used and played with.

"We have a private room in the back." Thomas's voice broke him from his thoughts and they went into a room behind a closed door.

At once Bruce recognized colleagues and other upper ranking males within their social circle. They greeted him with a simple nod. Taking a seat next to Thomas, Bruce felt a drink go into his hand and looked around for who it could have been but the person was completely gone. His eyes narrowed, looking around the room. The beverage reeked of brandy.

Having already checked up on each of the identities of these women, he knew that none were caught in anything too scandalous, a couple minor hits here and there but nothing to cause him alarm but his stomach twisted at the idea of having to sit down and to even pretend to enjoy this was going to test his skills at acting. More importantly, he could use this time to check on the whereabouts of his latest adversary. Taking out his cell, Bruce began to play with the records Alfred had uploaded.

The lights went down and the rowdiness of the younger generation was heard as the music started to play and the curtains to the back part of the stage opened, revealing no one there. There was a slight confusion but then cheering began from the back of the room and before he could turn around, Bruce felt a hand on his chest and a hot breath on his ear and he immediately stilled and resisted the urge to fight.

"A little tense there." The voice struck him deep in his ear and was the thing that he heard completely above the music. "Don't worry I can fix that."

He briefly felt his top button coming undone and adapt hands begin to trace his collar and under his shirt. Bruce was not sure what to make of what was happening to him but when he went to protest the unknown woman jumped around him, his eyes couldn't help but follow her body as it swayed to the music.

She was in front of him now as were the rest of the girls but she was the one that was directly in his line of sight and as much as every lesson from Alfred, his father told him to look away, he couldn't. But he was not subjecting her to the usual male gaze, instead he took in her muscular form compared to the other females. The way she moved was precise and much more calculated as if she were playing a part. Like many of the women she was wearing a wig, too long for her face, which was also a bit strange. At this point was so mesmerized with her and had a desperate want to look into her eyes...

Suddenly getting up and placing the glass that had been handed to him down on the table next to the chair he had just occupied, he headed to the back of the room where their private bar was. No one really noticed his departure, only when he blocked their views did the men care, but he knew he needed to get out of that situation.

"Seltzer." The standard flirtatious, mild manner Bruce Wayne had suddenly disappeared, leaving the gruff man, ordering people about. He was caught off guard for some reason and he didn't like it. Pulling out a tip for the woman behind the bar, he noticed her glee and briefly smiled back before getting drawn back into the scene before him.

It wasn't just the sight before him; it was the woman, the one that had managed to unnerve him. The way that she moved, her eyes were still downward. But she did not need to look up to capture the attention of the men in the room. She was fully aware of the situation and that she had managed to obtain all of their sights. There was no point in denying her attitude was seen faithfully there. Again, he looked her over, she had yet to take off her small outfit but finally the corset blocking the view of her stomach came off and he saw the fit and toned way her muscles moved. She was trained at something but he didn't know what. Perhaps a gymnast or she may have been well trained in yoga. But something about her body informed him that she was not just what she pretended to be. Her frame was far too muscular compared to the rest of girls, who were slim but not much else.

The music slowed and many of the girls left the stage to go closer to the men. He saw that this mysterious woman he had been watching, walked off from the upper platform and her sights were set on him. It was then he was able to catch her eyes because she had finally let him, but in the dim lighting he saw that he couldn't tell their color. The caked on make-up also prevented him from seeing too much of an actual identity of the woman. But as she prowled over to him, Bruce had an overwhelming sense of knowing her, of knowing her body. Although, he was not the type at all to be caught with a woman of this nature, the thought intrigued him. How would he know this woman? Why did he care so much?

"Can I buy you a real drink?" It was the first thing she said to him, her tone, her voice so recognizable.

"Already have one." Tipping his glass, he tried to smirk and fall back into a playful set but there was something about this that felt surreal. It caused him to feel off his usual outside demeanor when it came to women as Bruce Wayne. In front of her he felt like a fake, a phony, like she had seen his true side and he could not give her the one he wanted to give her. He leaned on the bar to act casual.

"Only seltzer?" A brow lifted gracefully and she moved closer to him, leaving very little space to move. "I'm disappointed, Mr. Wayne."

"Can't please everyone." He shrugged.

"Had a rough one last night?" Her eyes were amused by something and they were strange. A brown color but not really brown. It looked as though she was wearing special contact lenses.

"You should have been there." In an attempt to keep up his image, Bruce decided that two could play at this game and changed his body position so that his was fully facing her and leaning in to be of similar height. The new position allowed him to get a better look in her eyes and saw that there were flecks of a different color behind the lenses but it wasn't enough to fully tell what they were in the lighting.

"Really?" The way she said it, he was unsure if she was actually interested or just playing with him. "Perhaps I was there Mr. Wayne."

"Perhaps you were." Trying to flirt back, Bruce added. "You should call me Bruce, by the way, Mr. Wayne sounds a bit too old."

"Bruce." The word lingered on her tongue and he felt a foreign thrill go through him. "That sounds a bit old in itself."

"A family name." He assured her and wasn't expecting the hand that had touched him earlier to appear on his chest again. Her body moved into his a bit more. "I thought you're not allowed to..."

"I can do all the touching I want." She was right under him.

"What's your name?" Bruce asked, intrigued by and yet also weary of this woman all at the same time.

"Whatever you want it to be." Her answer was smooth and practiced.

"They tell you to say that?"

"Maybe." Arching a brow, the woman was not afraid of him at all nor was she trying to flirt with him for the sake of his money as the others were. Instead, she focused on him, hoping for something else, of which he was not sure what it was yet. "_They_, if you mean the owners, want me to indulge in all your fantasies and your questions."

"Really?" Bruce strangely enough wanted to follow up on this idea. "Do you get to play out any of your particular… fantasies?"

"All the time."

"What are your fantasies?"

"I've always been a sucker for nicknames."

"Nicknames?" His brows narrowed. Needless to say, the answer took his off he guard. The rest of his body was completely still, he felt enraptured by this woman. He noted how her lips were just below his and he could almost taste them. "What is yours?"

"Don't you know," a smirk, "you can never give yourself a nickname."

"I take it you have already given me a nickname then." He questioned.

"Of course." The woman replied.

"I'm afraid to ask what it is." Giving a light chuckle, he tried to keep his cool as she moved to her lips upward, making him lean down further. The breath was hot on his ear and he suppressed a shiver going down his back. For all the control that he had gained throughout the years, he was struggling right now, utterly struggling.

"You know," She didn't answer him directly yet, "nicknames need to have meaning, a purpose. Some times they are shared by two people, sometimes people dislike their real names and forgo them to be something else, an extension of who they are."

"You're avoiding to tell me so I assume it's bad." Bruce couldn't help the unease that he was beginning to feel and the lack of control.

"You're not going to like it." He could feel her smile.

"I'll decide that."

"Alright." Then she said a name that he was not expecting. A nickname that was reserved for only one person and _he_ barely let her get away with it. "Bats."

* * *

**So this is a completely different story and unrelated to all of my other ones. I have no idea if people are still reading and reviewing but I sure as hell hope they are! Enjoy!**

**-EV**


	2. Chapter 2

If the lights in the room were not already disorientating enough, Bruce felt as if they were trying to suffocate him and cast him down further into the shadow of himself. He stared at her but was highly unsure of what to say next. The reason she was familiar was because this was the woman that he had chased a countless number of times on the rooftops of the infamous city. Her name, he only knew as one word synonymous with his.

"You're right." In attempt to remain calm, Bruce backed off slightly and took a sip of his seltzer, wishing it were something a bit stronger. "I don't like it."

"You didn't complain last night." She didn't seem at all concerned with his current state of distress. In fact it enticed her to go towards him. "You know, in the middle of the Art Institute?"

"I wasn't at the museum opening last night." He stopped her. Flicking his watch, he silently took a picture of her and felt that he could better analyze it at home.

"Mr. Wayne." Her tongue clicked against the roof of her mouth, chiding him. "You should keep up with the society pages more, the museum opening is tonight."

"Well good thing I wasn't there." Replying without the even tone he normally had, he felt a need to get out of this situation and made a move to do so until her hand pressed against his. "I should really be..."

"Please." A brow lifted. "I know that you don't have any reasonable excuse to leave right now."

"You haven't given me a reason to stay." He pointed out then went to leave again before being shoved back by this woman in a surprisingly strong movement. Her strength was effortless and she appeared to let nothing more her aside. "What's your name?"

"I have quite a few of them." This woman was not stupid. She knew that he would not be able to touch her and she had all the advantage. The information was obviously not important at the moment as she took the time to visibly study his face. Bruce was taken aback by the scrutiny and felt the urge to look away but trained his eyes on her. He did a bit of his own observation and saw that she was wearing prosthetics and the "scar" on below her ear was fake but he had no doubt that others were real. "So this is the real man behind all that glamour and that mask?"

"Kitty!" Someone called out to her before he could even think of a reply or try to deny what she had said. It was a blonde that had called her over and _Kitty_ was quick to turn her head towards the name. The woman who yelled over the music gestured for her to come over. Kitty turned back to Bruce who was as still as a wood plank.

"Don't worry Mr. Wayne," She purred, her hand smoothing his collar, "I won't tell anyone your little secret."

"There's nothing to tell." He shrugged, lying was something that he had always been good at and this was no exception but she seemed to see right through his act. "You called me a winged rodent, if anything _I_ won't tell your superior."

"My superior?" Kitty chuckled. "Please, do I seem like the kind of woman to worry about a _superior_?"

"I don't know what kind of woman you are." That was another lie.

"You know," Obviously she was not buying his act at all, but he couldn't blame her. He was switching between two personalities quite suddenly. Honestly, Bruce was not positive why. Perhaps he was trying to fool her, keep her on her toes. Another reason was that he wasn't sure who he was himself. "I like you better when you're trying to arrest me."

"I've never…"

"Kitty!" The girl shouted again.

"Save it for tonight." Giving him a kiss on the cheek, she let her hands drop and her body swayed to the pulsing music around them as she walked away.

Bruce stood there for a moment, trapped. He knew for a fact that he had not played that to the best of his abilities. She had gotten the better of him. He wasn't sure how or why but she had. Although he probably should have been a bit more panicked than he actually was. This woman knew exactly the man behind the mask and she clearly was not afraid to tell him such. She had the gall to walk right up to him and tease him, which was apparently a trait that her masked personality had as well.

His lips pursed and he took another swig of his seltzer as if it were something other than clear, bubbled water. Another act on stage began and his eyes were focused entirely on her. The calculated way her hips swung and her personal dips. They were all for him and him alone. Her eyes were now trained on him and he was willing to let it be. The enticement from night to night of him chasing her and her teasing him had not changed, even now. She understood him on some level but they rarely ever spoke and when they did it was her testing him while he tended to be more gruff. This woman knew exactly who he was and he had yet to figure her out.

"Bruce!" Tommy's voice broke him from his thoughts and a hand appeared on his shoulder. "Enjoying yourself?"

"As much as I ever could." Putting on his jovial act, Bruce found it much easier with Tommy at his side.

"God," A hand rubbed itself on Tommy's face. "I can't believe I'm going to get married in six months and miss all of this."

"I wouldn't be too worried about that." There was a sudden gut reaction that Bruce had to that word. Marriage. That part of his life had died less than a year ago with Rachel.

"Yeah." Tommy smiled. "I guess we'll have a to wait until you throw yourself one of these but by that time we'll probably be using walkers. So any Mrs. Wayne on the horizon?"

"You would know better than me, Tommy." Anyone brought up the concept of settling down for Bruce in public, he often switched to another subject. However, in this moment, he was highly preoccupied with the woman dancing in front of him.

"I'm sure you'll find someone someday." He stated with the utmost confidence of someone who was about to get married.

"We all can't be as lucky as you." Bruce confirmed his single-hood. "Peyton is a rare woman to put up with you."

"I know." Tommy chuckled for a moment then sobered quickly. "Bruce, you can't keep doing this to yourself."

"What are you talking about?" Sincerely not understanding where this was coming from, Bruce was forced to look at the other man taking his eyesight off _Kitty_.

"These girls that you take home and they leave the next day." He gently prodded. "They're not going to fulfill you. You're running yourself ragged and it's not good."

"Have you and Alfred been conspiring against me?" Bruce joked but really wasn't. Alfred did have a way to sneak up on him at the most random times, most often in the forms of others.

"No, not at all." Tommy shook his head. "It just… all you have is work and these one night flings that mean nothing. Work is important to you, I get that, but these models or whatever that you want to date, I see it, you're empty."

"Peyton trying to fix me up with one of her friends again?" He asked with a smirk, trying to alleviate the sudden heaviness between them.

"No." Then he said something that surprised Bruce. "_I'm _worried."

"You don't need to worry about me, Tommy." Patting the man's shoulder, Bruce assured him. "I'm fine."

"I can see that you're lost or something." Obviously not believing him, Tommy continued. "Ever since Rachel died I…"

"She was a friend." His voice lower than he meant it.

"I get that." He said quickly. "But Peyton and I knew how you had always…"

"What's this really about Tommy?" Bruce's patience had run thin as it continually did when the subject of Rachel was brought up.

"Just…" Pausing to collect his words since he knew he was treading on very thin ice. Plus this really was not the place to be speaking of personal matters. "If you ever need to talk or anything, we're here for you."

"Thanks." Not about to write off a childhood friend completely, Bruce decided to take a higher road and just somewhat give into the man. After all, he couldn't ruin someone's hope for a love divine so readily right before that person got married, especially since he was the best man. Out of the corner of his eye he spotted that the woman that he had been so carefully watching was now gone. "I should get going."

"But we were just getting to the good part!" Tommy laughed.

"Some of us have to work in the morning." It was another well-known fact that Bruce Wayne was now on time for the office and he was taking on a more active role within the company. Many thought that this was a change due to Joker having almost decimated the city's population and the Wayne name, still being stable in the business world, bringing more jobs into the city and keeping the entire city afloat. Bruce was responsible for creating more grants, foundations and importing more of the company's assets in the city to prevent it from downsizing in anyway. Many foundations were in the names of the two defense attorneys that had died those months ago.

"Fair enough." Tommy agreed. "Hey, we should get together some time."

"Sounds good." Bruce nodded and went off again but was stopped by Tommy.

"I mean it." He insisted. "There's this circus coming to town next week, let's you, me and Peyton go. It'll be like when we were kids. Maybe we'll go to dinner beforehand. She would really like to see you again."

"Call me tomorrow." The sincerity in Tommy's voice was not lost on Bruce. There was a sudden need to spend time with this person that had been in his life for so long. Maybe he could stand having one friend that was not connected to his nighttime activities.

"Will you actually pick up?" It was supposed to be funny but a certain element of sarcasm was laced within the words.

"Maybe." Bruce smirked before shaking the man's hand and leaving the area, then the building. The car was already waiting for him when he exited out of the establishment. His mind went running through all the access points within the cameras throughout the space and if that didn't work, he was going to make sure the night would be more illuminating.

* * *

"Why didn't you just follow her?" Alfred's voice popped in his ear as Batman finished up a mugger, throwing him against the wall. A tad more violent than necessary but clearly Batman had a point to be made, he just wasn't sure what it was yet. "Wouldn't it be easier…"

"One moment." Throwing one more punch, Batman made sure the criminal was handcuffed and took the purse. Walking over to the scared woman, standing wide eyed at the large figure that was coming towards her.

"Thanks." Her voice was as shaky as her hands as they reached out for the purse.

Without saying anything, Batman shot up a line and reached the roof top, making sure that the woman hurried out into the main part of the street to catch a cab. Luckily one was just passing by and she was able to hail it. Batman hoped that the woman would use the twenty that he gave her instead of the overused credit card.

"As I was saying sir," noting where the younger man was, Alfred took up the opportunity to continue to ask him the important questions. "Why did you not just use the facial recognition software? I heard that can be quite useful."

"She had prosthetics on." Batman searched the street for any other illegal nightly activity and when he found nothing, he began to look through the police transmitter to see if there was anything they couldn't handle.

"Voice?"

"Too much unnatural inflection."

"Why not just follow her?" Wanting to return to this detail of his young master's folly, Alfred could not understand why he did not just do the simplest investigating.

"She disappeared before I could spot her again." One of the things about the woman was that she had managed to one up him thus far. Batman was unsure if he should be impressed or pissed off. If he was honest with himself, it was a mixture of both.

"And she said nothing else?" Alfred's brows furrowed.

"No." A shadow going into a building caused Batman to pay a bit more attention to his current surroundings. For the moment he wanted to see what the shadow was actually doing.

"Why did she just want to let you know then?" He questioned. "A ransom?"

"Didn't sound like it." Moving a bit closer to the scene, Batman saw the shadow was in the shape of the woman that he had come to know her in only this form.

"Well," Alfred sighed, "I must say sir, you attract the most peculiar people."

"Prepare the facial recognition software." Shooting a line across the street and landing silently on the fire escape of the building that he saw her in, Batman found an open window, probably the one that she had used, and climbed through it.

Looking through the darkness, Batman spotted her in the black, form fitting suit and her belt that he personally knew doubled as an armor-cutting whip. Her goggles were covering her eyes and he supposed she was working on opening yet another safe. As he heard the click of the safe, the floorboard under him creaked and she paused in her movements.

Batman also stopped and held out a sharp batarang, poised to throw. However, she continued opening the safe and he saw that inside the safe held both documents and cash of various nations. As she thumbed the cash, he took another step, careful not to land on any loose boards.

"You know," her voice was low and sultry, and she still hadn't turned around since she was taking the cash and putting it in the zipper in her chest. Finally she turned and faced him. "I heard you went you came in through the window."

"Put the money back." He told her. The facial recognition software already going to work on her face.

"You're not as sneaky as you like to think you are." Now she was just taunting him as usual. She stepped forward and stopped as soon as she saw that he went on the defensive him. "It doesn't have to be like this."

"Put it back." His tone lower and more threatening. Part of him was also frustrated that he was not getting any feedback from the software.

"Do you know where you are?" Her hands went to her hips and he became weary of the whip that could come out at any moment. When he didn't answer she provided. "A Falcone safe house. They were here just the last week preparing for a visitor."

"What visitor?" Batman was taken aback by the information. Yes he was aware that this apartment belonged to a member of the Falcones but he had thought that this member was clean.

"Not sure." She shrugged. "You're the detective you should know."

"The Falcones were shut down." He informed.

"You really believe that?" The leather clad woman was not afraid of him, never had been actually.

"What do you know about the Falcone Family?"

"Wouldn't you like to know?" A smirk came to her face and she approached him. "The Falcones happen to be one the families that started this city then went south unlike yours…" A sharp look caused a low chuckle to rise. "Don't worry, your secret is safe with me Bats."

"Why do you believe the Falcones are trying to come back?" Batman questioned her. There had been nothing to report on from his end of the spectrum and his various informants, perhaps he needed to go back out there to do some work.

"Why wouldn't they try?" She replied, closer to him than she had ever been before. It was as if she wanted to be found out or it was a continuation of her taunting, showing him that she was the one that could out play him. Especially since the software had yet to come up with her face and he was growing more frustrated by the second. "For now though, let's pretend this meeting never happened."

"I can't let you walk away with that." If could just stall a bit longer perhaps her face would finally show up in his files.

"So you would rather have it stay with a mob family?" To that, he could not reply and she knew it. As she gave a self satisfying smirk, she walked away but he caught her by the arm. "I'm not any databases, Bats, so don't bother looking for me."

"This won't happen again." He told her.

"Why don't I believe you?"

"You will get caught."

"I'm counting on it." Then she went out the window before he was able to even think about trailing after her. He had no choice but to stare at the space she had just previously occupied.

"I'm afraid, sir that she does not…" Alfred came back on to the link in his ear.

"That's fine." Going towards the open safe, he knew that she would have never left it open without cause. She was leaving him a clue but why? What would bringing down the Falcone family mean to her?

Grabbing the contents of the files inside, he sighed heavily. Grabbing for the camera in his wrist, Batman began taking pictures of the files to send back to the cave to log them into the computer.

"Found something interesting sir?" Alfred perked up again and after reading the first photograph sent his eyes widened.

"Take a look." Batman did another.

"That's very interesting indeed."

* * *

"You don't have to keep doing this Selina." Taking one of the full bags from the woman, Gwen just shook her head and went towards the kitchen. "You have to worry about yourself."

"I do." Selina followed Gwen into the small kitchenette area, putting down the two other grocery bags on the counter. Then shook out her short dark hair from the rain that had fallen on it moments earlier. "The moment you guys sit down for dinner, I can finally sleep without all that foot padding above me."

"I swear..." Gwen rolled her eyes and moved some of the braids out of her way as she began the relentless fight with her neighbor and putting the food that she did not ask for away. "You need a hobby."

"I have one." Deciding to also help with placing the various food items in their designated areas, Selina steadily took the disapproving looks from her friend.

"Get another." She suggested. "You know like knitting or something."

"Do you honestly think that I would be any good at knitting?" Selina questioned.

"What about settling down sometime soon?" After Gwen received a chuckle from her friend, she took that as a no.

"How's Bill?" The question allowed the two women to come to a truce of sorts. "Will he get parole soon?"

"Hopefully." Gwen sighed, accepting the shoulder to lean on for a moment since she rarely had them as of late. "But he's been tryin' and nothing is really working."

"Jackasses." A couple of canned vegetables made it into the cupboard. "You think they'd be lenient with him, he was a minor player that didn't get out as quickly as the head."

"They want him to talk." She told Selina. "Give up who the boss is."

"Lefty will kill him." Shaking her head at the absurdity of the whole thing.

"Unless they can do a private trial and clear his name through the Dent Act." Trying to make it sound better to anyone's ears, Gwen wanted that approach. "The entire family could go into witness protection."

"The Dent Act is a joke." Selina rolled her eyes and saw the hurt. "Sorry Gwen."

"No, you're right." She shrugged. "But right now, it's all we have."

"Who's your lawyer?"

"A woman." Clearly Gwen's faith in this lawyer was not great. "Carly something, she's nice but smart."

"Doesn't sound like you like her that much." Selina commented, taking out the last jar from the bag and placing it in the cupboard.

"We have to take what we can get." Resorting to the downside of their position, Gwen was finished with the conversation and decidedly moved on. "So anything else exciting besides stealing from the rich? Run into your favorite creature of the night lately?"

"Which one?" Giving a snort of amusement, Selina sort of knew where she was going with this but given her circumstances she wanted to make sure.

"The one that begins with a B and ends with a man?" She asked.

"Well," Selina shrugged. "He does like to show up from time to time."

"Are you having trouble…"

"Gwen." Stopping her friend, Selina turned to make her statement clear. "The less you know the better."

"I probably don't want to know anyway." Gwen admitted. "If I hadn't walked in that night, you would've never told me would you."

"No." Selina breathed.

"You haven't had anything that bad since right?" In an attempt to hear only the minor details, Gwen knew how good Selina was but there was a part of her that hated seeing her friend put herself through this. Especially after that night, it was the worse thing Gwen had seen in a while.

"I'm still here aren't I?" She smirked.

"Girl," Shaking her head, Gwen informed. "This is all going to catch up with you one day."

"Ah," Selina put up a finger, "but it hasn't yet."

* * *

**Woot! People are still reading out there! Hopefully this story will quip some curiosity and will be different enough to keep you coming back for more. **

**-EV**


	3. Chapter 3

Selina woke up at the sound of her alarm and with a smack shut it down. Rolling over she did not want to open her eyes just yet but rather than prolong the inevitable she glanced at the time.

"Shit." She grumbled and jumped out of bed.

Grabbing the nearest tank top and black button down, she managed to find a change of underwear and semi-clean black pants. Running into the bathroom, she quickly went through her routine of brushing teeth, face wash, all the while putting her clothes on. Then a certain animalistic noise caught her attention and she glanced down, toothbrush still in her mouth and pants having yet to be buttoned and the small black cat that stood with its tail in the air staring at her.

"Yeah," Selina spit and then walked into the small kitchen, "I wish someone fed me too."

Reaching up into the cupboards, Selina took down a can of tuna and popped open the top. Instead of placing it on a dish or anything fancy, she just put the can down on the floor and let the cat gnaw on the newly opened can of fish. The mess to the right caught her eye of the empty tuna cans toppled each other and she gave a sigh.

Perhaps tonight she could take the night off and just clean. Or do it before she left, which was much more conducive to her current situation. Although she was not expecting any visitors, one never did know when a certain bat would get his head out of his ass and figure things out. Luckily he had stayed away from the apartment. Maybe it was due to the smell that was beginning to take over as she spent less time cleaning and more time trying to pay for the insignificant apartment as well as other more important things. Selina felt she needed someone to do the dirty work for her. Perhaps she should hire someone.

"Hey!" The door swung open and revealed Karon standing on the other side. "Glad I could catch you."

"Karon I have to go to work and…"

"I got something." Her teeth were a brilliant white against her dark skin and the way her light brown eyes danced, Selina knew it had to be good.

"It better be big because I'm going to get fired if I'm late again." Selina told her.

"Don't worry," Karon smirked, "You're going to be able to quit that stupid ass job."

"Which is?" Deciding to not stand in the kitchen any longer, Selina moved back into the bathroom to finish up her short askew hair and put on some make up.

"The Falcones."

"I already did that." Selina's eyes rolled. "And got a couple hundred thousand or something like that."

"No." She leaned against the frame and crossed her arms. "The compound."

"Jesus." A laugh escaped her. "The compound? I mean I know it's a ton…"

"Listen." Karon steadied the conversation. "It's an archive. Where they keep all their records and shit but we can drain the account."

"What do you mean?" Not really having time for this but she wanting to know if she didn't have to work at the restaurant any more. Selina would be a much happier person to be away from that place. Problem solved.

"I need you to get into the accounts physically to upload the chip into the banking system that they have." She explained. "Then from the backend I can trickle the money into a separate account completely devoid of any information about us."

"Sounds too good to be true." Selina replied doubtfully.

"It's not." Karon assured. "Plus if you don't want to do the trickle down, there'll be the paper cash there as well since it's a safe that you have to go into."

"Why?"

"Because that's the only way they allow any sort of transaction of the Family to go through." Not that she wanted to question her friend, but Selina had to try to get how safe this could be.

"How is it they link it back to us?" That was the only thing really holding her back. Selina had managed to slip through one too many cracks and last time she encountered the Batman she had been lucky her intelligence did not let her down. At the moment, she was hoping that once again it would pull her through.

"I got the highest block on the transaction, they'll barely notice the cash flow going down because it will look like it's staying the same when they check it." Clearly proud of the idea, Karon smiled. "The moment they notice they'll have only a couple hundred thousand left and we'll have millions."

"And if anyone ever finds the laptop doing this?" Selina needed to try to pick out all the details in order for this to work. She was still young and saw many more heists in the days ahead but if she didn't have to do this any more, she would find something else to get her adrenaline pumping. Maybe skydive or something.

"It shuts down completely if someone other than you or I touches it." She shrugged. "So you in?"

Weighing her options for a moment, Selina had to ponder whether or not to go through with this crazy plan. Sure it sounded great but the actual process of doing this and not getting caught was something else. Yes, she had stolen from the Falcones just the other night and couple of times before that. Plus she did not mind seeing that Family go down further into the filth that they lived in but she was beginning to gather her own evidence to bring them down. However, it would be nice for them to have no way to easily bail the other out or bribe anyone else in the city. That money was as good as hers anyway. Besides, it wasn't as if she had not made her decision when Karon had run into the apartment, so Selina simply questioned.

"When do you need me?"

* * *

"The mob wants to create a more stable base within Gotham to secure their assets." Bruce laid out the plan before Alfred as he was getting driven to work and bringing up the information on his tablet. "How did this happen?"

"They haven't gone through with it yet." Alfred assured the younger man, noticing the traffic a bit heavier than usual rush hour traffic.

"According to these files they have." Seeing the names linked with very prominent companies of Gotham and even some across the States, Bruce began to flip through the people at Wayne Enterprises that could possibly be related to this. "A person in every company to filter in the money for them."

"To do what?" He questioned.

"It's left out." Not noticing any people from his own company first time around, Bruce began to filter through those that he knew would not be linked with the mob.

"That is quite unhelpful." After hearing Bruce give a noise of agreement, Alfred continued. "I thought the various Families were gone after the Joker."

"He knocked out the majority of them." Although not one to enjoy talking about the clown that ruined his life, Bruce poked through another clean employee. "But the mob does have that tendency to come back."

"Very true." Knowing that this meant more sleepless nights for the two of them, Alfred noted that he needed to buy more coffee. "Perhaps your friend is working for them, that is why you continually run into her."

"My friend?" The doubtfulness in his tone caused Alfred to almost smile.

"The one with the cat ears?"

"You mean those aggravating claws?" Bruce sighed. "I don't think so, she's stealing from them."

"But only them." He pointed out. "Perhaps it is a ploy for you to trust her."

"She's not working for them." His head shook.

"You seem very sure of yourself." Alfred commented, pulling into the secure garage connected to the office building.

"If I wasn't so sure of myself, I wouldn't be here." Truly he meant to say alive but with the state of things as they were, Bruce went for the lesser words. Before getting out of the car, he asked. "Look through some of the social invitations received in the past couple days."

"Resurrecting your social life, sir?" Finally, something that Alfred was not entirely opposed to.

"Look for anything that could have a possible connection to the Falcone family." Successfully leaving the car before Alfred could refute, he nodded. "Make sure it's at one of their houses."

Then closed the door just as Alfred opened his mouth. Deciding it wasn't worth it to hear the protest that would come from the older man if he hung around the area, Bruce walked to the door and saw Lucius already waiting for him. Putting on a smile, as he was genuinely happy to see the man, Bruce strode over.

"Lucius." Bruce greeted, getting into the elevator beside him.

"How are you today, Mr. Wayne?" His brown eyes twinkled.

"Well." He nodded. "And yourself?"

"Surprisingly awake." As they smiled, Bruce questioned. "How is Tanya?"

"Had a bit of a cold for the past two days but nothing too new." Rarely did Bruce really get into the gritty details of family life but when it happened the young man appeared more than interested.

"I'm sorry to hear that." How he said it was not just a rub off but he truly meant it. "And how are all your kids?"

"Tam has a new boyfriend." He sighed. "Luke and Tim are fighting already since coming back from school. Tiffany and her wife are thinking of having kids."

"That's good news." Bruce did enjoy hearing about other people's family life. Perhaps it was a strange indulgence from time to time but it was something that reminded him that there was something else at one point. Now, he lived vicariously through the stories. "Mostly."

"It's family life." They arrived at their floor. "Which reminds me, when are you planning on settling down?"

"Not any time soon." Though not many would catch the meaning, Fox did and it earned him a look of disapproval that often sat on Alfred's face.

"Well if you're interested," Fox smirked at seeing the sigh that Bruce produced from the thought, "I know someone."

"I don't think that…" Walking through the door that he held open for both himself and Fox, Bruce was cut off as the door closed behind him.

"She's right up your alley." Going through the motions of readying his office for the day, Fox busied himself. "Enjoys the nightlife much like yourself and seems to enjoy breaking the rules just as much as you do."

Flopping down the newspaper on the desk, Bruce was forced to look down and see what the man had been smiling about the entire time. One of the few people to escape his grasp was on the fifth page of the paper that day. Her outline blurry and he took into account that the Falcone safe house had not been the only place that she visited that night.

"The Cat?" Reading the title Bruce questioned the wording choice.

"She's referred to many times in the article as such." Sitting down, Lucius looked up at him. "She seems to keep slipping your grasp."

He huffed in reply, glancing over the article.

"Like most women." Although it was meant to be a joke, Fox saw the brief pain that crossed the younger man's eyes. "Bruce, you can't keep…"

"Next time," putting down the paper, Bruce also took a seat, "I'll be sure to put out a bowl of milk."

"Bruce." Leaning forward, Lucius made sure he had his attention. "You need to move on." Nothing. "It wasn't your fault…"

"I'm f…"

"You're not fine." Interrupting earned him a look but he pressed forward knowing that someone had to. "I know why you keep asking about my family and why you've disappeared from the social scene, throwing yourself into your work. You're better than that, Bruce and though she's gone…"

"You don't…"

"I'm not finished." Lucius spoke in a calm, controlled voice as though he was speaking to his children and by all accounts at this point in time he was. Bruce was many a thing including a man with the utmost intellect but he sorely lacked the willingness to use it in human interaction. Perhaps it was due to his parent's deaths but he had always been a fairly quiet child. "You don't see yourself pass this anymore and it worries some of us."

"You and Alfred?" It was a snarky sounding reply but Lucius took it without missing a beat.

"We're the only ones that you let into your life." He pointed out. "There's more to life than pain, Bruce. I hope that one day you'll see that."

For a moment Bruce contemplated the words and took them into his psyche. It was true that only Lucius and Alfred knew what he was up to and that was only when he let them. Yes, they would lecture him about how he couldn't do this forever and so on. He just happened to disagree with them.

"Lucius." Standing up, Bruce saw the look of utter belief cross the other man's face. "I need you to look over some employee information and send me their personal files."

"I can't do that Bruce." His brows narrowed both at the request and switch of information. "I've done enough immoral things for you, I will not add another to that list."

"You won't empower me, you mean." A small smirk appeared and he explained the reason. "The Falcone Family is infiltrating all of the major businesses within Gotham and across the States. They're draining the companies of the money."

"I'll look into it," and added, "to the extent that I feel comfortable."

"Thank you." Noting the switch of mood in the room, Bruce was well aware of his friend's and guardian's dislikes for his nighttime activities and their attempts at trying to limit themselves at giving him the tools he needed. Especially the one that he had left behind a long time ago and who was inching her way back into his life little by little. However, he knew their weakness was the fact that they ultimately wanted to see him be safe and succeed. "Now, what do you have for me today Mr. Fox?"

* * *

"You really don't have to do this one, Selina." Karon brought up the contents on the laptop as she sat at the small kitchen counter. "Especially since you're going for the Falcone Family. Why would you ruin your chances?"

"I'm not ruining any chances." Assuring her friend, Selina prepared herself for the night. "It's an easy job, get in, get out with a lot of cash."

"Sure it's big." She conceded. "But not as big as…"

"Two million each?" As she paused to look at her friend, Selina saw the worry and sighed. "I've been up against big guns before, this is nothing new. I'll be fine."

"The shipment of some black market items that are the main thing they're worried about." Mapping out the city and uploading the information Karon was able to obtain from the databases, she showed them to Selina. "Don't bother with the goods just the cash. It should be located in the fifth train car. Luckily it's so much they won't even know it's gone."

"Perfect." Selina nodded, deciding to go out the back way, she looked over to Karon. "Hey Karon? How's Holly?"

"In rehab." Karon swallowed some her pride at the mention of her girlfriend. "That's too expensive."

Without saying anything else, Selina took the personal information with her into the night. Though she may not have the best way of doing things and helping others, she knew what she was good at and used it to her advantage.

"What about your sister?" Although Karon understood Selina's unwillingness to talk about her sister, she sometimes needed to be reminded that she also had stakes.

"At the convent." Selina briefly stated. "But fine." A pause and then, "so the cargo gets in at two fifteen in the morning."

"Their such idiots." Karon sighed.

"That they are." She had to agree.

"I mean the Batman doesn't go out during the day, you think they'd learn." Typing some more codes on the laptop, she felt her friend looking at her. "It's true. Come on, you know that you could go out in the daylight and get as much done as you do at night."

"It's just more convenient at night." Selina nodded. "But Bats doesn't think that the mob is working properly since he came around."

"How do you know that?" Looking over the top of the screen, Karon looked amused. "You guys have coffee or something."

"Something." She said absentmindedly and something on the screen caught her eye. "Karon, what if I said that we could get more than just the two mill?"

"I'd say you're crazy." Karon stated plainly. "But go on."

"In a month or so," deciding to ignore that little bit, Selina went on, "there's a party for the Falone Family celebrating a wedding."

"How does that translate into getting more money?" A brow lifted.

"They'll be distracted." Selina continued. "It'll be easier to get onto the grounds too, just slip through security and bam, we're in. Cracking the safe will be a piece of cake and since they don't trust the banks any more to keep their funds, you know there's a lot in there."

"What do you need me to do?" Though she was far from a killjoy, Karon did require information to play off of.

"The backend stuff." She told her. "The usual. Just hack into their interface security system, tell me what they have and the codes required."

"You could do that." Not that Karon didn't want to be apart of this, considering the payout, she didn't see the need for her skills as such, Selina had a handful of her own.

"I got some other things to do." Selina informed.

"Alright." A simple heist, nothing too elaborate as this one planned for tonight or even the next day but an excellent payout nonetheless. "But let's go through some things for tonight."

* * *

**If I said that the next chapter will be more interesting would you believe me? But seriously I'm so excited for the next upcoming chapters and I really don't want to disappoint but I may update later this week. Yes, that's how excited I am and how much I want to get the ball rolling with this story. I will also promise that there will be plenty of Bat/Cat interaction in both forms. This was just setting some things up for future goodness! Get excited folks the circus is indeed coming to town ;)**

**-EV**


	4. Chapter 4

"So what are you going to do with your half?" Karon questioned in Selina' s linked ear as Selina surveyed the people below in the cargo holdings of the train.

"I think it's time to get out of that shithole of an apartment I have." Noting the four guys around the perimeter and then the six unloading the car into a truck, Selina knew that she had her work cut out for her if they caught her. The if was fairly large.

"Ditto." The clacking of the computer could be heard from the other end. "Oh here's a nice one, overlooking the park… seven hundred and fifty thousand…. new appliances and everything."

"Too steep for me." Selina smirked at the lack of focus on the task at hand from the other end. Nothing too serious right now, they could afford to be a little more laid back about this one. "I have to get Gwen a better lawyer and help with them getting the hell outta this city."

"Shit, that reminds me." Karon sighed. "I gotta pay those damn rehab bills." A pause. "Ah well, next heist."

"I'm surprised you guys don't want to relocate." Spotting a car sitting on the side, no doubt the head watching and making sure his shipment was safe or a least a top shelf guy.

"After Holly gets out, I think we are." Again with the keyboard sounds. "But Gotham's home and honestly I don't know if we could leave."

"Karon," Selina saw another strange thing and went forward, she had to strike soon as they were still in the midst of unpacking. "Get the block up and running."

"Got it." She confirmed after a moment and Selina was already down by the cars but on the other side as not to cause any sudden disturbances. Selina also noticed that one of the cars had a screen lit up through the windshields. Even the heads were bored with the operation already. "Hey where's your boyfriend?"

"You mean that jackass who almost made me miss out on that couple hundred thousand the other night?" Not really having considered it, Selina had to stop and think for a moment. Yes it was strange that he had yet to show up. Usually he was on top of these types of things. Her thought stopped short once she opened the cargo door and saw the red beams flitter their way through the darkness.

"Fortune must be on our side tonight." Karon commented and then saw the point at which Selina was at. "Alright so the code is Alpha Fox-Trot Charlie."

"Seriously?" Pausing, Selina was unclear if that was a joke as she stared at the keypad on the door.

"Seriously." Karon confirmed. "The lasers should go out in five, four, three, two…"

"Thanks, Karon." Going forward with the whole thing, Selina could not believe how easy this was, there had to be a catch.

"So there are in fact a few bum safes in there and you need to figure out which ones are not the bums." Explaining further, Selina caught on to what Karon was saying. The catch. "You get the bums, you get a bomb. It's that simple."

"You're still boring me Karon." Looking around her for the time being, Selina tried to figure out which ones were the rigid ones and the ones that happened to not be so. Though it was pretty intense for a simple job. They were probably worried about either her or someone else finding out about them and better to get rid of evidence altogether than only some of it.

"According to the notes from the gangster men," Karon skimmed them more so than reading directly, "shards of metal will implode from the explosive. Sound more fun?"

"They could've done better." Selina shrugged and took out the advance mini metal detector from her shoe. It would be easier to pick out the useful and non-useful safes now. Finally picking out one, Selina managed to quickly take out her equipment, lowering her goggles for a better look see into the object.

It also got quiet on the other end, obviously Karon leaving Selina to concentrate on the task at hand. Circulating the dial around to the correct numbers, Selina heard a footstep on the gravel coming towards her and hurried her work. Still she had to make sure that the numbers were aligned with what she had down.

"Selina." Karon's voice called to her and the footstep came nearer.

"Hold it."

"Selina." Again and a bit more urgent sounding, the footstep so close now.

"One second, Karon." Selina hissed, letting the last digit go in place and then finally a click of the locks opening for her. A smile formed to her face as she looked into the contents of the safe. "Perfect."

"The goose is out of the nest!" Karon's rushed tone, alerted Selina as she grabbed the safe's items and jumped behind the wall of dark objects as the footsteps came straight to the opening of the train's car.

"What are you talking about?" Waiting for a moment, Selina was positive that she had not been seen.

"They tracked my location." The woman sounded as if she was running around.

"How?" Selina could still hear shuffling outside the car's doors and knew she had to wait a moment longer.

"I was..." a sigh, "I was poking around in their interface and on their cameras."

"Damn it, Karon!" Sensing a time to silently move, Selina spotted a possible exit of a ladder leading to the roof of the car. If that didn't work, front exit for a sweeping escape.

"I'm getting off the link and making sure they won't track you too."

"Wait, Karon!" Her heart began to pound. How could they have tracked them? "Meeting place?"

There was a pause and Selina worried that she had already shut down the link. Finally Karon answered, "Harem."

Then there was nothing and Selina's ear was now fully clear of the device, knowing that Karon would not turn it back on. She knew that she would be safe once she reached the designated destination. In all honesty, it would be a couple days before Selina would be able to even reach Karon in person but luckily this was not a first time their cover had been blown.

Finally, the there was a pair of falling footsteps and Selina could breath again. Slowly creeping out of her hiding place, she poked around and saw that it was basically clear for her to get out of her spot. Of course she heard outside shouting as she stood and began to walk towards the exit. A black figure stopped her in her tracks.

"Aren't you a pretty little …" The man unsheathed a knife and Selina lifted a brow.

"I suggest you walk away from this." If he thought that was threatening, he should see what she could do in her sleep. "Don't want to tell your boys about getting beat up by a girl."

"I don't have to tell them." Beckoning for others to join him three other men came into the car.

"Good." She smirked, feeling someone come up behind her. "Because when I remove your jaw from its socket, you won't be able to tell anyone. "

As the man grabbed her, Selina easily knocked him unconscious by hitting him in the temple with the brass knuckles that she had been slipping on while distracting him. They were hired hands and obviously more muscle than focus and brains. Bringing him forward so she could take the gun and bring her elbow down on the back of his head with a knee to his face, Selina focused the gun on the men before her. They all had a look of surprise.

"I'll give you three seconds to leave and pretend this never happened." Formulating another plan in her head, Selina watched as one of the men came forward. She forced him to stop when she shot him in the foot. "Next?"

Before they even moved towards her, she knew that they were going to come for her so she turned to the rest of the safes and shot directly in the center of the keypad. They all heard the tick of the bombs inside go off and Selina took the opportunity to jump out of the train car, catching herself on the gravel and running towards the next nearest hiding place for the incoming mob men that were alerted to the explosive noise. Also, taking as much cover as she could as the car blew its top and sent out the metal shards towards the on-comers. Selina was lucky that more people were concerned about the exploding car.

Checking over her body, she saw that a couple shards had managed to graze her costume as one neatly embedded itself in her shoulder. She must have missed that due to adrenaline. Closing her eyes and preparing for the pain that would follow, Selina jerked the metal out of her shoulder and saw how large it actually was and noted that it thankfully had not gone that deep and hit something important. Savoring the moment of restfulness, Selina heard the shouts in the distance and knew they would be looking for her.

This was not her first heist, she knew what to do and she also knew that this wasn't going to be her last.

* * *

Bruce sat in his chair below the manor that he knew so well. It was easier working from here because people were unable to bother him as much. In the penthouse one or two neighbors would bother showing up from time to time and Alfred gave his excuses. But from out here, it was quiet, just the way he liked it.

"I suppose," well mostly quiet, Alfred was coming over to him carrying a tray of some sort of hot beverage and a meal, Bruce only looked for a moment before turning back to the footage. "You have heard of someone tampering with the recent mob acquisitions, I take it?"

"It's that woman." Bruce brought the blurred image up of right before the explosion. "She's been taking from the mob. Cash and some jewels."

"And you decided to let her go?" Putting the tray down, Alfred looked at the younger man.

"I didn't hear about this heist." He sat back and thought for a moment. The only sounds in the cave became the squeaking of the bats overhead. "She has someone working for her."

"Or with her." Alfred offered. "She also could be quite capable of doing this herself."

Without speaking, Bruce stood slightly and brought up the bits of the recordings he could gather on the high frequency that she and her partner had been using. Stopping once they got too ragged, Bruce explained. "Karon. She said the woman's name at one point but it was too muffled in the other links going on that it was lost. Starts with a C or S. But Karon is the woman who is working for her."

"Did she manage to take anything?" Slightly impressed that this woman had his ward so confused and flustered, Alfred had to hand it to her. She knew what she was doing.

"The car that she was in exploded, so I assume she managed to steal some of the cash that was designated for that train car." Bruce brought up some more pieces of information. He felt eyes in the back of his head and he finally snapped. "What?"

"There's more to life than this, Master Bruce." Alfred's voice was stern but soft. "You are locking yourself up into this…"

"I'm protecting the people of…"

"You are part of that people." Raising his tone a tad, Alfred returned it to normal when Bruce looked at him. "Need I remind you that you are not above them in any way. I don't care about how many times I have to stitch you up. I care about how many times you make it home and that this cowl doesn't replace your mindset of you being better than anyone else." A pause to collect himself. "You have worked outside of the law for too long, perhaps it is time for you to rejoin the surface world."

"There is nothing for me there." Bruce stated quietly.

"How would you know?" Tired of this back and forth, Alfred had his plan already set in motion. "You haven't seen daylight except from your cars and your damn office. The only people that you encounter are those of work, Fox and myself. You have not bothered to have a life as Bruce Wayne…"

"Because he's useless." It was under the illusion of controlled anger in which he said this.

"You cannot save everyone Bruce." Knowing what this was really about, Alfred saw a twitch in the man's facade. "And neither can Batman."

"He can try." Bruce insisted.

"He can." Alfred agreed. "But you're losing out on life."

"What do you suggest I do?" His brows narrowed. "Quit?"

"The thought never crossed my mind." The tone said otherwise. "Since you will continue on this journey why not revisit the past a bit?"

Bruce huffed. "I don't think I would like to do that."

"I don't mean in the forms of death and destruction." Alfred informed. "Perhaps a nice outing, with Mr. Elliot and his fiancée, Ms. Riley."

"You already called them didn't you?" He had to hand it to the man; he knew how to keep him surprised.

"I have been setting your play dates up since you were four years old, Master Bruce," shrugging, he began to set out the coffee in front of the man to force him to eat it, "I don't see why that should change any time soon."

"So where am I to go?" Finally, Bruce took a sip of coffee and noted how much he needed it. "Another bachelor party?"

"Close." Alfred placed the pile of eggs and ham in front of him. "A circus."

"A what?" Looking up, he saw that the butler was in no way joking about this. "You're serious?"

"I am." He nodded. "You are to accompany Ms. Riley and Mr. Elliot to dinner and then go to the circus."

"This isn't a double date is it?" Bruce asked wearily.

"I was assured that it was no such thing." Alfred paused to let Bruce take a bite of his breakfast and had a smile when he stated his words and the billionaire choked on his food. "Although I wonder if the woman you've been chasing around for the past two months would be interested in such things."

"She does enough acrobatics that she could…" Wiping his mouth, Bruce stopped himself and immediately turned to the computer to type in but Alfred got to the question before he even finished.

"The circus just got in two nights ago." Assuring the man that the woman that he had been chasing around the city had nothing to do with the arrival of the circus, Alfred added. "Cheer up, Master Wayne. Tomorrow night could change your life."

"I've watched plenty of people tame tigers." He grumbled, taking another bite. "It loses its charm after a while."

"I meant in that you may learn to have a little fun."

* * *

Selina dabbed at the wound, happy that they had no followed her to her apartment. Luckily they were more worried about the explosion than they were about her. Plus she had even more luck on her side when she had the fortuitous chance of run into an old friend.

"Thought you were gettin' your scrawny ass outta Gotham, kid." The rough male voice made her smile from her spot on the bathtub ledge and she glanced up to see the man that matched his voice very well.

"Awe Slam," finishing the touches on leg as she had seen another deeply embedded piece of metal. The shoulder had been taken care of long ago. "You know I'd miss you too much."

"Selina Kyle." His head shook and he blew out the cigarette smoke through his nose. "You should know that your girlish charms don't work on me any more."

"Really?" As she stood, Selina went over to his form leaning on the doorway and got close enough to feel the hot breath on her face. "Then why did you pick my scrawny ass up tonight?"

"Beauty should not be wasted on the mob." He replied, moving so she could pass.

"Personal motto?" She chuckled, going to her suit's belt and pulling out the cash and other materials from the various pockets that she managed to escape with. Placing it on the kitchen counter, she counted in her head and gave a nod of satisfaction.

Slam provided a low whistle as he looked over the cash just sitting on the table. "Plan on buying the mob?"

"Half of it is Karon and Holly's. A lot of it is going to Gwen so she and Bill can get the hell outta here." As she began to divide it up, she heard him let out a huff of amusement. "What?"

"You have such a soft heart." Slam found an empty dirty dish and put his ashes in it. "Next thing you'll be telling me that you're getting a charity fund together for all the little orphans of the city."

Rolling her eyes, Selina zipped the bag up. "You remember where St. Magdalene is?"

He paused and carefully lowered his cigarette. Slowly, he stated. "You know they'll be looking all over the place…"

"Their trail's cold." Holding up her phone, Slam saw the light and Selina explained. "Come on."

For a moment they traveled down the stairwell in silence, Selina carefully to take some of her own half with her. It was a custom of hers, mainly just in case they found out where she lived or something else happened and she needed to get out of town quick. In fact, that was how Slam and her had officially ended their couple trysts they had. She needed an out and she had taken it without so much as a good bye not. Since her return a couple months ago, this was the first time they had run into each other.

As they got into the car, silence came over them. Now was the time that it got awkward.

"So, uh, how was… uh…" Slam ventured, lighting another cig.

"We're going to do this now?" She attempted to look out the window by chance something would catch her eye to avoid the conversation at all costs.

"Hell yes, we are." He growled. "You the one that left, kid, what do you want me to say?"

"Nothing." Shaking her head, she could feel everything beginning to weigh on her. "You don't have to say anything."

"Screw that." Slam took a long drag and then pointed at her. "You should've told me where you were going…"

"I can't believe you're actually doing this." Her hand went to her head and Selina rubbed it.

"And I had to find out from the squirt." He added, ignoring her ramblings to herself. "For two weeks, I didn't know where you were…"

"Calm down, Slam." Selina assured him. "I just needed to get out of town for a bit."

"I thought you were dead, Selina." Emphasizing that last words, she could see that it stung. To him perhaps it was more than just those couple of nights and in all honesty, she would never know because she wouldn't ask him. "Dead."

"Alright." She had to give in just a bit. "I didn't think that… this was an issue with you, you know when I have to go, I gotta go. No questions, no trace. I'm gone."

"Yeah, well," he spat out his words like bad chili, "I thought I meant more to you."

"You mean a lot, Slam." This time she turned in her seat to look at him, luckily they were at a red light and they had to pause. Not like it mattered, Slam would stop traffic for her and she knew it. Selina wasn't lying the man did mean a lot to her but there would always be something holding her back. "But you know I can't…"

"Yeah, yeah." Slam gave a long sigh and looked back to the traffic. "I know."

"It's not like you can either." Selina gave him a certain look and went to cheer him up. "Don't bullshit me, you could never love a woman after Helena and you know it."

Giving a small smile, there was a truce in the car and he finally asked. "Where did you go, kid?"

"Around." They were getting close and so far no signs of any mobster. "A stint in Metropolis, Chicago, New York, even Star City for a hot minute. None of them is quite like Gotham."

"You mean with you costumed freaks running around?" It was good naturedly in tone but on some level he hated what she did. Running around, just waiting to be caught by that Batman.

"It's becoming a trend actually." Selina mumbled and saw the cathedral. Before jumping out of the car, she told him while grabbing the bag. "Circle until I get out, there should be a nice café if I'm longer than five minutes."

"You should talk with both of them." He gave her long hard stare that strangely reminded her of the teachers she had in the day.

Shooting across the car, Selina hugged and kissed his cheek, whispering. "I've missed you too Slam." Then bounded out of the car.

Scouting the area for a moment, she knew that no one would dare touch this place. It was the only place in Gotham that had been practically untouched by the mob and various other corrupt peoples that had tried to get at it. The safest place that Selina had known and where she knew others could be kept that way as well.

Instead of going through the front entrance that she knew would be closed, Selina snuck around to the side of the large cathedral and gave four rhythmic knocks. Holding tightly to the strap on her shoulder, Selina berated herself at still being in awe and guilt around this place. So many exchanges had happened here and though some good there were also bad ones. The door slightly opened and Selina let out a breath of air that she had been holding.

"Get in." The nun standing at the other end grabbed her arm and ushered into the place. Closing the door and doubly locking it, the nun turned and quickly looked her over. Then threw herself towards Selina.

"Hey, I'm here." Slightly taken aback by this shock, Selina patted her back. "I'm here, Maggie."

"It's…" Drawing back, Maggie took in a shaky breath. "Karon… she's…"

"What's wrong?" Her heart began to race. "Where is she?"

"We have Leslie and everything should…"

"Where's Karon, Maggie?" Selina's voice turned stern.

"Back room." Taking the lead, Maggie went forward. "Come on."

Selina followed in silence and then saw the mess surrounding one of her closest friends. Her eyes widened and immediately went to Karon's side. Battered and bruised were the least of it. One of Karon's eyes could barely open and her leg jutted out in an unnatural fashion. Her arms were held to her sides and had cuts running up and down them. Her face was bruised and it looked like a hundred men had beaten her up. And Selina wouldn't put it past the mob to do this.

"Karon." Kneeling beside the bed, Selina held back tears. "I'm so sorry."

"Please like you haven't seen me worse." She was trying to make jokes.

"I knew we should've stopped…"

"Shut up." Karon's one eye narrowed. "I still have my teeth and at the moment that's what counts. No gunshots, nothing fatal, just beat up."

"Badly." Selina added quietly.

"They didn't get any of the information either." That was definitely a surprise, but Selina did not care about that right now. Instead seeing her friend lying in this bed, mangled was something she would never forget and it would haunt her like everything else.

"I don't care…"

"Of course you do." Karon said fiercely. "Everything is blocked from here on out, they won't get past these firewalls. Next heist we…"

"There's not going to be a next one." Selina instated. "Not for you."

"What?" Despite the heavy bruising and bleeding, Karon wanted to rise but Selina held her down.

"Stop it or they'll kick me out." She hissed and the protest ceased. "Karon, when Holly gets here, you guys are leaving town…"

"We can't leave you here." Karon protested.

"Tough shit." Taking the reigns of the situation, Selina was not going to see another one of her friends get shot down by these awful people. There had been enough death in her life. "You guys are going to head upstate with Gwen and her family once you feel better and Bill gets out which should be in a couple weeks, especially with that leg."

"This old thing?" Indicating the leg with a slap, Karon winced and Selina gave a knowing glance. They had a long stare off before Karon asked. "What about the big one?"

"I'll get it to you som…"

"No." Karon cut her off. "Who'll be your back up?"

"You said it yourself," Selina smirked, "I'm a big girl, I can do it myself."

"Selina." Maggie's voice cut in.

"Go." Karon encouraged. "I'm surrounded by women taking care of me, what more could I want?"

"I'll be back." Kissing Karon's cheek, Selina whispered, "Money's behind St. Sebastian."

Then they walked towards the door.

"You can't keep doing this, Selina." Maggie stated in a soft tone.

"People need money, Mags." Selina sighed. "This is the only way I know how."

"People are getting hurt." They stopped and Maggie turned to her. "What if that was…"

"Didn't the convent threatened to close earlier this year?" She did not need to hear a self-righteous speech from her right now.

"That's not the point." Maggie wavered.

"Your bit is behind the Virgin." Selina nodded towards the statue in the corridor. "It should hold over this place until next year."

"This isn't a life, Selina." It was the same every time; hence Selina did not enjoy this bit. "One day that's going to be you."

"It already has been." Jutting out her jaw definitely, Selina let the scars of her past show on her neck through the small ones on her face that she managed to find healing solutions for.

"We have someone getting Holly from the facility." Maggie sighed.

"Good." Selina nodded. "I'll call tomorrow for an upstate place to take her, they can go there."

There was a moment of silence before Maggie spoke, "Selina, I do wish that you would chose something else. Something that would make you happy."

"I am happy." Putting a hand on her shoulder, Selina smiled. "Besides shouldn't I be the one telling you that? I am the older one after all."

"You know what I mean." Maggie insisted much to her sister's dismay. "You can't keep this up forever and when you were little you said…"

"Things change." Today of all days, she didn't need to be reminded of the past. Deciding it was time to go, Selina pulled her sister in for a hug and a kiss on the younger woman's forehead and told her. "Be careful of those priests."

* * *

**Yey two updates in one week! However, I do have a question for you guys, is anyone actually reading this story or is this not your guys' cup of tea? I did want to build Selina's story up a little bit more and next chapter, let's just say I really want to get right but hopefully it will be out next week. Please let me know what you think and Happy NYCC weekend! I'll be tweeting this weekend shhh_librarian about NYCC, so if anyone is interested that's the kind of stuff I follow and will hopefully be able to put up some links for those that can't come.**

-**EV**


	5. Chapter 5

"Come on Bruce," Taking a sip of her wine glass, Peyton chuckled alongside Tommy at the playboys' antics, "you can't tell us that you don't want to tell settle down any time soon?"

"Now why would I do a thing like that?" Bruce commented, letting a smile play on his lips, playing the part of the single friend to a tee.

"Seriously?" Tommy's arm was draped across the back of Peyton's chair and though it was a small gesture Bruce noticed it and felt the empty side next to him. "You don't want anyone to nag you when you don't put the toilet seat down or take your car without asking or have to sleep on the couch from a drunken night because you don't want to get yelled at?"

"That's if you even make it to the couch." Peyton inserted and turned back to the single man at the table. "But honestly, no one?"

"I'm living the dream that every man wants to." Even in his state of mind, Bruce felt the lie burn into him. The very essence of everything that he hated was right there and he was acting it out perfectly. "Why ruin it?"

"Bruce Wayne," still having that upturned lip, Peyton, the old friend, could see directly past the act, "I don't know why you're so insistent on this but mark my words you will find someone and you are going to fall so hard. God help that woman." She began to rise.

"Help the woman?" Bruce questioned.

"You may fool everyone into thinking you don't care but I know the day that you meet her your world will change." Her insistence was so infectious that Bruce could not help but hope it was a little bit true somewhere in him. Somewhere really deep within him. "Now if you boys will excuse me, I have to use the ladies' room."

She left, leaving the two men to look thoughtfully after her. Each for their own reasons and not in the same way but neither disrespectful in anyway.

"Oh Peyton." Tommy shook his head.

"She was always a sucker for a loss cause." Bruce acknowledged. He was surprisingly having a decent time, though he kept his phone close to him in case anything were to happen.

"Why do you think she's marrying me?" He chuckled back but then became slightly more serious. "Bruce, I know that Rachel…

"It's fine." Quickly stating as he didn't want to get into this right now. Tommy had been making plenty of comments throughout the night and honestly, Bruce just wanted to forget about it for once.

"No, let me get this out." Putting up his hand, Tommy leaned forward a bit. "I know she meant a lot to you and I know that her going around with Dent hurt you more than you want to admit, but I don't think she was ever right for you."  
Rightly so Bruce stayed quiet, playing with the bottom of his drink.

"I don't think she would have made you happy." He continued without being asked to. "You don't want to hear it, I get it, but you need to see that there are other women. Other women that will be better for you and that will get you and whatever you do nowadays."

"What do you mean?" That caught his attention and Bruce's head snapped up, eyes narrowing slightly even though he wanted to remain neutral.

"Well you know." Tommy shrugged. "You just… keep yourself in the office and the Manor a lot now. There's rumors that you have orgies and shit but when I saw you at the party, you were more closed up than ever. In fact it was the first time I saw you in a month was at the party and before that we met at your office for a coffee. You're not exactly the party animal you used to be."

"It's been busy at the office." He replied suddenly wishing he was actually having gin and tonic as he sipped the seltzer.

"You've been busy since Rachel died." Although he had never been truly astute to the emotions of others, Tommy did strangely get Bruce. Perhaps it was because they have been friends for so long or that they both had been outcasts at their school growing up or it was because of the fact that a young Bruce Wayne had indulged Tommy on his deepest secret of liking Rachel more than a friend. However, it really had not been that difficult to figure out.

"Alright gentlemen." Not bothering to sit down, Peyton looked between the two of them. "Are you ready to see some lions and tigers and bears?"

"Oh my." Tommy replied good naturedly, standing up while Bruce just wiped away the grimness from his being and followed suit.

"What's the matter Bruce?" Peyton smirked taking Tommy's hand as they began to leave the restaurant. "Are you afraid of big cats?"

"Not at…" Unable to finish his sentence, Bruce had turned so fast and directly into someone.

"I'm so sorry sir." It was a waitress, the one that he had caught eyes with very briefly when they had first entered the restaurant.

"Are you alright?" Noting that there was not any food or drinks lying around them he understood it to be her just walking to place orders. Then he looked down at her.

"Yes." Green eyes glanced back and then down. She was a good actress but not good enough to see that she was mildly annoyed with the transaction happening. "I'm fine."

"Is that…"

"Bruce," Tommy caught his attention, "stop bugging the poor woman and let's go! They'll be plenty of other girls you can hit on, even if they are a little hairy."

Peyton gave a loud giggle as the couple headed for the door to get the car and Bruce was quickly reminded of his persona in society. However this woman looked strangely familiar. Looking back down at her, he saw that she was not upset in the normal way but merely amused like she had been in on a secret.

"That was unnecessary." Trying to apologize for his friend, Bruce saw the sharp angles of her face and the beautiful olive skin. "I'm sorry for that…"

"It's alright Mr. Wayne." Her voice. "I'm a big girl. I handle myself."

The tone of her words and the intonation caused him to react very quickly. She went to leave and he immediately grabbed her arm. Whipping back around, the dark green eyes caught his hazel ones and they paused. It was her.

"Mr. Wayne." A lower registered tone came into his ear, forcing him to briefly acknowledge the host before lessening his grip and just plainly staring at the woman they had dubbed his counterpart. Catwoman. "Your credit card."

"Thank you." Taking the card from over his shoulder, he asked the waitress. "I haven't seen you around here, are you new?"

"I usually work days." She replied smoothly. "I'm not really a nighttime person."

"So lunch." He deduced, completely taken by the fact that he had found her. This woman that had alluded for months was right in front of him. Each knew who each other were but he could not do anything about it, at least as Bruce Wayne.

"Usually." They were alluding what truly needed to be asked. The real questions that were on the tip of his tongue that could not be asked in this setting. But as she spoke her lips mesmerized him. His eyes trailed down more and he noticed the barely covering mark on her shoulder. A bandage. Probably something given to her from the explosion from a couple nights before and from the train cargo that she was trying to get. She must have felt his stare because she cleared her throat to bring his eyes back. There was no fear there, no apology.

"Bruce!" It was Tommy calling from the door. "Come on!"

"What's your name?" Bruce instantly went for it, putting her on the spot, trying to get her to spill.

"Does it…"

"Selina!" She had gotten her own call. The disappointment flooded her face as another waitress came over and whispered to her. "Can you take over that table for Mr. Cobblepot? I can't handle him anymore."

"Yeah, I got it." Selina sighed, she had been discovered and she was well aware that by spilling her first name her last would just be as easily obtainable.

"Thanks. I owe you." And the waitress walked off to the next table.

"What a lovely name." Bruce said with a smile and she didn't return the gesture. "Perhaps I'll see you at lunch sometime."

"Have a good evening, Mr. Wayne." Although she did not need to spit the words out the manner in which she spoke them made it very clear that she did not appreciate his nonchalant attitude about the whole thing.

They both walked away from another at similar times but as she walked towards the undesirable table that she no doubt agreed to just to get out of speaking with him, Bruce, at a fraction of a second, decided to look back and watch her interact with the people at the table. From that he got that she was indeed putting on an amiable act and smiled at them as if no one had discovered her secret. She had said something and they all laughed, even the notorious gangster with a penchant for penguins gave a hearty chuckle. And from that he got it. Not clad in leather or Kevlar or trying to attack him in any way, she was just dressed in a black button down with black pants. She did not wear a lot of make up, but that was due to the fact that she really didn't need it. Her manner was collected and everything about her was highly charismatic, she pulled you in as she pick pocketed you. She was stunning, absolutely stunning.

"You okay there?" Clapping him on the back Tommy looked down at Bruce. "What was that all about?"

"Oh," thinking quickly, Bruce cleared his throat as they exited, "thought I recognized her from this party."

"Someone like _that_ was at your party?" God, he couldn't believe that was what he had come up or that he was friends with someone that was an incredible snob.

"Thought she was this waitress I found in the closet with Greg once." Trying to shrug the feeling that came over him off. "She wasn't."

"What and you wanted to get some closet time before the circus?" Tommy chuckled and to sound even more elementary he added. "I'm glad to finally see the old Bruce coming back."

Deciding not to answer as the car came into view, Bruce couldn't shake the feeling of those green eyes. He was happy that he had the back seat as Tommy took the driver side and Peyton was already in the passenger's seat. Hopefully he could get rid of this feeling before they got to the circus.

"Everything alright?" Peyton questioned.

"Just Bruce being Bruce." Tommy smiled at her as well and they kissed briefly.

"Did you see Natasha again?" Half turning in her seat to see him as the car started and they rode off together. "I heard she's married now."

"No." Not giving Bruce a chance to answer, Tommy quickly made it through the downtown proper. "A waitress."

"Bruce!" Peyton gasped in a scandalous manner and smiled. "I never knew you to like anyone… like that."

"Peyton has some friends you know." Tommy added. "Maybe you can go out with them sometime…"

"Stop it, Tommy." She rolled her eyes then turned back to Bruce. "He doesn't need to hear anymore from us." A pause. "So you've heard about this circus right?"

"It's one of the last true traveling circuses around." Happy with the change in subject, Bruce nodded. "I'm surprised it hasn't run into financial trouble yet."

"I'm sure it has." Peyton shrugged. "Especially after the economy busted. "

"There was an article in the Tribune about it." Also getting the vibe that Bruce's love life was off the table, Tommy joined in. "I guess they were one of the only things that wasn't really effected by, actually I think they mentioned that they were doing better than ten years ago because Haly was able to keep the prices down and since its cheaper than a movie people went."

"Oh I read that!" She remembered. "It said that they were just recently appraised and since it's the last traveling circus and they exceeded their revenues over the last ten years, it's worth over five million."

"Too bad we're not in the business for buying nostalgic circuses, Bruce." Tommy glanced in the rear view mirror at his friend. "We could make some money off of them."

"And ruin it by corporate expansion, no thank you." There were few times that Bruce let his dislike for the underworld of business to show through and usually it caught people off guard.

"I hear you." The other man agreed. "Hey, remember the last time the circus was in town? We were, what like eight? It was a group of us, right?"

"Your parents took us and Rachel." Bruce silently reminded himself that it was a month right after his parents were murdered. The trip to the circus was an attempt to cheer him up and it had been his first outing. Needless to say he did not feel much differently afterwards.

"Wow!" Peyton broke the two from the memories and forced them to look ahead through the windshield. "I'm loving the size of the tent and how they went all out for this."

Indeed the current view of the circus harkened back to his childhood. Performers entertained the guests outside of the tent and while they waited in line to get their seats. Animals were settled in their cages and the visiting children's eyes were wide at the large creatures so close to them.

As they parked and got out of the car, Bruce admired the laughter and the carefree attitude of everyone present. They neared and fire-breathers and many other entertainers drew closer to them, Peyton gasped at one point from the flames. Then the threesome stood in line. Bruce glanced around for a moment.

"Too bad I don't have to go to the bathroom now." Peyton sighed. "I bet it's empty because everyone just wants to get to their seats."

"I can hold our space." Tommy offered.

"Nah."

"I should go." Bruce nodded. "I'll be right back."

"Mind getting us some cotton candy?" Tommy questioned.

Bruce held out his hand.

"What?"

"I need some money if you want cotton candy."

"You…"

"I'll be back." Bruce smiled, feeling a bit better about the whole night. Sure he wasn't really used to the whole going out without a care in the world and a night that did not have a point other than to reconnect with someone. Admittedly, this was… nice, even with bumping into the woman that often made his nights a living hell.

In the attempt to find the bathroom, he dully noted where the refreshment section was and then rounded another corner. It was much less crowded and he thought that perhaps it was because Peyton was right that more people were looking for the line to get in rather than the bathroom.

"….I told you no." A man's voice caught his ear and Bruce perked right up. He sounded stressed and unhappy. "I don't know how else to tell you that…"

"Listen Brian," Another man was there and Bruce approached the tent with caution. "You know that you're going to need some protection since you're starting to come back to the cities."

"We've been doing cities since the early nineteen twenties." Brian sighed. "I think we'll be fine, Tony."

"Hear me out…"

"I've done that four times already." Brian grumbled. "I don't know who your backers are but I'm not liking what I hear so get on out before I sick the tigers on you."

"Are you threatening me?" The Tony person sounded appalled and Bruce recognized the name and was trying to place it.

"It's just a joke." Brian waved it off. "Now if you don't mind we have a perform…"

"What if something were to happen?" Tony interrupted. "Just a random accident."

"How many times do I have to tell you this?" Brian sighed. "I have the best insurance out there and on top of that, I don't like your business dealings."

"I'm just offering friendly advice."

"I know the type of crowd you run with Tony Zucco," the mob, Tony Zucco worked for the mob. A mid-level guy with some leverage, not much but enough. "My daughter told me all about it."

"Did she?" Suddenly getting dangerously low, Bruce began to wonder why Zucco was pushing this so hard. "So then you know that family is very important in my line of work, a family, if you need me to remind you, that you belong to by happenstance."

"Tony." A sigh. "When she married you, I didn't say anything and I didn't stand up when I should've. I stayed out of your guys' business and so I ask you to stay out of mine." One moment passed. "We'll can have see each other on Sunday for dinner and not talk about it any more and I'll forget how pushy you were."

"But we're…"

"Stop." Brian's tone went up. "I know you both are having financial troubles since that clown or…"

"Joker."

"Killed your head but I honestly cannot do this." Then he said sincerely, "I'm sorry."

Bruce's attention was drawn a sudden noise to his left as were the other men's. A boy with dark brown hair and tan skin caught a disc on its way down from the shelf, presumably right after he had bumped the shelf on the side. The boy's arm was outstretched overhead and he was trying to hold the large box with one hand over his head, stopping it from falling over completely.

Hurrying over to the scene, Bruce gave the boy a hand without saying anything and noted how heavy the box actually was. The kid was strong.

"Need help?" Bruce questioned as the kid's blue eyes widened after realizing that he was actually being helped.

"Thanks!" Rubbing his arm after Bruce had pushed the box back securely on the shelf. "This is going to mess my whole performance."

"You're performing?" The boy could not be any older than ten but Bruce observed the type of clothing that he was wearing and came to the same conclusion.

"Yeah." He shrugged, still holding the disc. "I do all the stunts…"

"Dick?" Brian came forward with Tony Zucco trailing a little behind him. Getting a view of Bruce, Zucco's eyes widened a bit. "You alright?"

"Fine." Dick excluded the information from earlier but Bruce was not going to let that slide especially if it was true that he was supposed to be doing stunts. "The box just almost fell but he helped me."

"He might have hurt his arm." Bruce inputted and saw the quick glare that Dick gave him for tattling.

"How?" Brian wanted to know.

"The box was pretty heavy." Not letting Dick cut in for fear that he might shrug off any injury, Bruce stepped in once again to the dismay of the kid.

"Maybe you should sit this one out, Dick." Brian commented, eyeing him with worry.

"Mr. Haly," Dick's eyes widened with despair. "I can't do that!"

"We'll talk to your parents." Brian Haly sighed and then turned to Bruce. "Thanks for helping our little Dick here. He's notorious for pushing himself a bit too much."

"The box looked heavy and I was on my way to the bathroom." Bruce shrugged, looking at Dick out of the corner of his eye and saw how he was holding his arm. The kid was strong but the weight of the box may have strained a muscle on impact.

"Well thank you again Mister…" Holding out his hand, Brian Haly paused.

"Wayne." Bruce took the hand and shook it as brief recognition in Brian's eyes came in. "But Bruce, please. What's in those boxes anyway? They're quite heavy."

"Oh it's just chains and shackles for our escape artist." Brian waved it off but Bruce's eyes widened. "The bathroom is right over there by the way."

"Thank you." Nodding his head, Bruce looked to Dick. "Ice it for thirty minutes and stretch it, you should be okay but don't push it."

"Are you a doctor?" Dick asked. "Because that would make you only the third doctor I've talked to."

"My father was." As he gave a smile to the boy, then glanced back at Brian. "Have a good show."

"Hope you enjoy it." Brian smiled, putting a shoulder on Dick.

Bruce gave a brief glance towards Zucco, not liking the feeling he was getting from the man and walked off towards the direction of which he was told.

Although Zucco did not pose that much a threat as much as the rest of the mob did, he knew that Anthony Zucco was connected to the Maroni family as his mother was the sister of Salavdor Maroni, who had just recently died from a car crash eight months ago. It left the Falcones and Maronis in a particularly vulnerable state because the head of the families were split between Sal's son Vincent and Carmine's daughter, Sofia. And now Alberto was coming back into the picture, which would be an interesting event within itself.

The rest of the mob families, were not the big players in the Gotham scene as they once were. Most had left and went to their second out postings, hoping to get away from the craziness that was Gotham. Most went to Chicago, where the Falcones had a heavy hand there with their Viti side of the family. The Falcones were now running their operations mostly through storefronts and in the seediest alleyways. Apparently Zucco was in charge of their insurance front.

Getting back to the entrance of the tent, Bruce saw that the line was no longer there and it appeared that show time was on the verge of happening. Flashing the ticket to get into the big tent, Bruce spotted Tommy and Peyton waving at him. Tommy doing a silly, standing wave and Peyton just rolling her eyes and laughing his antics.

"Did you fall in?" Tommy asked as Bruce climbed over a couple people to sit down next to his friends.

"Saw one of the performers, stopped to talk to him." Bruce shrugged and the lights began to dim.

The loud announcer's voice, which he recognized as Brian Haly, reverberated around the expansive space. Bruce let himself be taken in by the show going on in the center of the ring as the lights in the audience went down and the lights of the rings came on. First, acrobats came to the stage. The pure strength and agility he knew it took for the stunts to happen, he had to admire in the performer's bodies. They were lean muscle and their skill had noticeably been perfected with time.

However, during the quieter moments, Bruce took the opportunity to observe Peyton and Tommy. It was well known that even in knowing Peyton, Tommy had been an actual womanizer and notorious playboy that people believed Bruce to be, took Tommy anyway. They both had known Peyton their entire lives. Her family was in the news business, from the papers to the television and was quite a know it all growing up. Since her father had built the business, she was considered more of an outcast amongst the wealthy, more established families of Gotham but the Rileys found comfort with the Wayne Family and soon most of the elite welcomed them.

When the two met, both Tommy and Peyton disliked each other and that was putting it mildly. Tommy still had the great attitude that his parents had taught him of entitlement and Peyton not being worthy to be in the boy's presence made herself known by harassing Tommy. This continued until college, or so Tommy informed Bruce when he got back from his travels. Peyton had been in an abusive relationship with some man and Tommy, seeing the effects one night during a reunion of sorts with various childhood friends, punched the man as he went after Peyton. After long talks and safety assurances, Peyton and Tommy grew closer.

It wasn't anything highly romantic but it was something that Bruce enjoyed. He knew that Tommy was a good person and Peyton brought that out in him. Perhaps she was the only one that could because Tommy's mother was the quintessential older, extremely wealthy, egoist that Tommy was in danger of becoming. Peyton had saved him from himself.

"And now!" Haley's voice boomed. "The Flying Graysons!"

Bruce applauded with the rest of the audience and saw a threesome at the top of the platform with a net underneath. One of the people looked extremely familiar and he smirked to himself, noting that it was the boy from before. The injury must have not been that bad as the boy waved the same arm that he had been worried about earlier. He stood beside what Bruce supposed to be his parents considering the similar features the boy had to the couple. They all stood straight with smiles stretched across their lips.

As they began, Bruce was surprised by the sheer grace of the family flying through the air. Apparently skills it took to do such feats ran in the family. The boy was especially good with the few tricks that his parents allowed him to accomplish. Finally, they made the boy climb down but not without taking a bow, multiple ones at that, the kid enjoyed the spotlight, a natural performer. Leaving the high platforms, Dick was off to the side and the net below the couple was taken away. Gasps and shock murmuring filled the stadium.

The routine began as any other routine would. The Grayson's graceful limbs catching and throwing another, performing tricks and using acrobatics to capture the audience's attention was enthralling. It was on the fourth swing that Bruce noticed a jerk but they kept performing. Perhaps it was a fluke.

Then there was another jerk from the rope and it was then that Bruce noticed the brief glances between the two that despite their performance training, they could not hide. The rope was unstable and the couple knew too late. They were in the middle of a swing and on the third jerk it happened.

Some people screamed, the majority looked away but Bruce was unable to and then his eyes went straight to the boy instead of the people falling to the ground. There was not a net to catch them as it had been taken away the moment Dick had left the scene. It was terrifying as Dick was tried to be held back by Haly who had run up to catch the boy before Dick had attempted to run beneath his falling parents' bodies but was able to break free the moment the bodies hit the floor, lifeless.

To Bruce, the silence was deafening but there were more shouts of sadness and commotion going on around him but he did not notice to any of it. His attention and focus was completely on Dick who approached his parent's bodies and just stared at them. For a moment the child sat between the two of them and glanced from one to the other. Carefully, he went to go touch his father's hand and then his mother's. Perhaps unknowingly tears began to drip down his cheeks and Bruce felt his pain.

Then Dick's head shot up and his bewildered eyes focused on something, just off to the side and not enough for anyone else to see. Bruce was drawn to the same spot and saw the figure of Tony Zucco peaking out from against a small opening of the tent. Dick's eyes did more than glare at the man. Dick was able to the see the guilt and yet overly passive face that Zucco had on before he hurried off into the night.

Vaguely hearing that the tent was being emptied, Bruce still sat in his seat, watching Dick. After Zucco was gone, Dick still sat there and seeing how his parent's arms were outstretched between them as if they were reaching for another in their sleep, Dick moved further between them. Their fingers almost touching the other's and in that moment, Dick put his head down and lay with his parents for the last time.

* * *

**So we all knew it had to happen. I just hope that I did it justice. However, you guys are reading this! More good news, upcoming chapters will have Dick Grayson antics and Bat and Cat moments, especially since they both know who each other are. Hope you're still enjoying.**

**-EV**


	6. Chapter 6

"The ropes look worn." Renee crouched down by the fallen ropes and taken down equipment, trying to get every last detail in the books.

"We just replaced them today." Haly shook his head.

"Did they have any… rivalries?" Jim asked quietly.

"Not that I know of." His face showed all the signs of a man in mourning. "They were wonderful people, I highly doubt that they would have anyone trying to harm them."

"What about you?" Not one to be completely tactful, Renee asked the harder questions.

"I… I don't." He sighed looking at the sheets. "It could be anyone."

"Do you know of them fighting with anyone recently?" Jim wanted to know. "Maybe a family member? A friend? And upset member of the circus?"

"I just… I don't think that anyone would… I don't think so." Haly was at such a loss right now. "The Graysons were wonderful people and we are all so close. Family. I can't imagine anyone resorting to this."

"Well we need to go through everyone just to be safe." Understanding the shake up, Jim wanted to be kind to the man but had a feeling that he was hiding something. Though he did not believe that Haly was responsible for this, he felt as though he knew something the rest didn't. "The boy can't stay here just in case."

"What's going to happen to him?" The new voice caused everyone to turn and see Bruce Wayne standing silently by. No one had noticed the imposing man in their presence as they had been caught up by the unfortunate event.

"We'll need to put him into a safe environment." Jim explained carefully, unsure of why the prince of Gotham had chosen to stay behind. Of all people to sneak pass not only the press and police, why would he, in a fairly ruffled state want to see what exactly was going on.

"Where?" Bruce's eyes went to the covered bodies.

"We have a few families that are good." Also nodding to Haly, who seemed also surprised at the appearance of the playboy, Jim added. "But they're out of the city, more upstate…"

"He can stay with me." The words caused the people still in the area to stop short of what they were doing and momentarily stare at the man infamous for his belligerent nights and overall not-childproof man. On the other hand, he was also the person who shelled out a ton of money for various charities, housing projects, city incentives, and for the civil workers of the city. Most importantly, he was one of the most famous orphans on the east coast.

"Mr. Wayne," Jim started, "we wouldn't want to bother you with…"

"Nonsense." Trying to stay in a neutral tone, Bruce couldn't help but slip in the sympathy and the emotion that he thought had been left behind years ago. "The Manor has the safest security system in the whole city and plenty of room for him to run around."

"It would be better for him to stay close to the city, if possible." Renee added. Well aware of the oddities of Bruce Wayne, she was happy to have their evidence close at hand. "In case we need to question if he saw anything or to stay close to something that he knows, shouldn't give him that much of a shock."

"I'd say he's already in shock, Detective." Bruce stated quietly.

All their eyes turned to the small human sitting on the low barricades of the ring and without saying anything Bruce went over to him. Dick was still staring at the sheet he knew to be covering his parents' bodies, completely unmoving and in his costume from the show. It was an interesting mix of colors but mostly made up of red and green.

Kneeling down, Bruce tried to block the devastating view. Dick looked at him with empty eyes and Bruce attempted a smile. Carefully he took off his jacket and put it around Dick, who looked surprised at the action.

"It's the best I can do." Bruce told him in a hushed voice.

Without saying anything, Dick pulled the jacket further around him and looked down at his feet. It was then his shoulders began to shake and the dreaded tears began to fall. He did not sob aloud but instead chose to crumble a little and Bruce caught him, feeling small arms go instantly around him. Not needing any further push, Bruce returned the gesture, wanting the boy to know that he knew exactly how he felt. Most importantly that he wasn't alone.

"Who knew he was so good with kids." Renee commented and the two men looked at her and she only shrugged. "Don't act like you knew."

"We'll still keep an eye on the boy." Jim assured Haly. "And Mr. Wayne, despite his exploits, is a very philanthropic man, I don't doubt that Mr. Grayson would be in good hands."

"I'm glad that he can stay close." Haly nodded. "John and Mary were born here, hopefully he'll like it just as much as they did."

"Why leave?" Renee questioned.

"Don't know." Obliviously to Haly it didn't matter. Sighing Haly watched as Dick held on to Bruce for dear life. The two detectives shared a look. "I should go get some of his things."

Then left the two cops staring between the scene, Haly walking away and Bruce Wayne letting Dick almost choke him to death.

"How long do you think before Wayne wants to give the kid back?" Renee muttered.

Though she was in jest, Jim had a very strong flashback to over two decades ago doing something similar to a young Bruce, before he had left for those years and returned as a pompous idiot. But he wasn't acting like that now, in fact, Bruce was acting very much the guardian of a boy he didn't even know. Sure here and there Jim randomly heard mention of the philanthropic acts the man was capable of doing and quite frankly he didn't really care about much else. He didn't have the time.

But all those rag magazines would be put to shame right now as Bruce finally picked up the boy and began walking over to them. A silent protector of the young Dick and there was decision in his head that perhaps Bruce Wayne was not as high and mighty as the world thought he was. Maybe this would cause him to see that there was more to life than just his nightly dealings.

Finally Jim said, "I wouldn't put money on it."

* * *

"Are you sure this is the man?" Alfred questioned as they both looked at the computer screen. "Anthony Zucco."

"I saw him leave the stadium in a hurry." Bruce nodded. "As did Dick."

"Ah yes, young Mister Richard." There was another comment to be made but it hung in the air.

"Haly and Zucco were fighting about money." Putting it simply, Bruce ignored the glance from his longtime companion.

"A common thing to fight about."

"Zucco wanted Haly to buy insurance from him. Haly's daughter seems to have married Zucco and Haly tolerates it. Zucco's in trouble and so goes to a family member for help." As he brought up some more information on the situation, Bruce finally addressed the situation. "Would you like to say something Alfred?"

"Only that I am curious as to how long our new guest will be staying here." Alfred questioned.

"As long as he needs to be kept safe." Not truly wanting to get into this right now, Bruce kept his mouth shut and began to memorize the computer files that he brought up.

"Will you be changing your habits considering the indefinite stay?" Someone was not willing to follow his lead.

"I see no reason to." Bruce shrugged. "Only to be more careful."

"So he won't be staying long then?" Alfred was highly conflicted about their new arrival. Though Dick Grayson seemed like a genuinely good person, one could never tell with someone that age. At the moment though, Bruce had managed to slip the child a sedative in order for him to sleep. He remembered a time when his young master woke up from continued nightmares and he briefly wondered if he could go through that again. More for the boy sake than his own, Alfred prayed that he didn't but knew otherwise.

"I don't know." That was another thing, Bruce really didn't know. Part of him wanted to get the boy out as soon as possible but the other part just wanted to see him get better or at least be able to handle things on his own. Quite frankly, he was rarely around children and was ill equipped at how to handle them. Yes, comfort them and such in times of need but helping someone get through this kind of emotional anguish, well, he was still on that road.

"He needs someone to look out for him." Alfred pushed forward with the conversation. "To raise him. Could you do that? With your running around and such?"

"This is not permanent." He assured.

"And if becomes such?" This was another human being who was in pain and Alfred was not going to take this lying down. "I know you won't give this up but perhaps you should think about…"

"We'll revisit it when it becomes an issue." Rising from his seat, Bruce made a move to change out of the bat suit.

"Master Wayne." Only slightly catching the younger man's attention, Alfred continued anyway. "This boy, is not one of the victims that you just found on the streets, you actively vouched for him to stay here. Therefore you need to treat him better than any other guest staying at this manor."

"I'll talk to him tomorrow." Obviously someone did not understand the finer details of child-rearing.

"No." Alfred enforced the rule. "You will spend time with the boy because that is what he needs. You will not play detective and you will listen and remember his every word."

"Alfred I don't…" Putting on his sweats, Bruce sighed.

"You do." He informed. "As far as I'm concerned this _indefinite stay_ is permanent and you will act accordingly."

"Meaning?" Done with his changing Bruce crossed his arms and turned to the butler.

"Meaning," There was not a second thought about this, "you will act as though he is your child and…"

"What?"

"… care for him as that." Alfred went up to him. "This is personal, do not pretend otherwise." There was a pause, then Alfred told him. "Do not let what happened to you happen to him."

* * *

"Selina we can't." Gwen sat on the couch, the kids had already gone to bed and it was just the two of them. "We can't accept this."

"You can and you will." Placing the money between them, Selina put a hand on her friend's shoulder. "I already made a few calls for a small town upstate, far enough away, with no mob connections. You'll both have jobs and a house."

"You bought us a house?" Her eyes widened.

"Don't worry I took it from your half." Selina smirked and then became serious again. "You said you wanted the kids to grow up and be able to run around. Gwen this is your chance."

"But you need this too." They needed the money but Gwen was not going to give into this. "I can't take a million."

"Too late." Having already planned out the finer details, Selina informed her. "It's already in your account, or at least it's trickling into your account from another to not rouse suspicions."

"Why are you doing this?" Her head was spinning. "We can't pay you back."

"Don't think about that." Then shrugged. "Think about this as a new beginning. Both of us want this family to be safe and we both know for any of that to work you need to leave." A pause. "Not that I want to but it's better this way."

"You've always been too good to us." Tears stung in the back of Gwen's eyes. "I don't know how to thank you." Then captured her in a hug.

"Do something I can't." Selina quietly to her. "Live this life."

"Selina," Pulling back Gwen gave her a sad stare. "If you would just…"

"We all make decisions." Deciding it was time to leave, Selina rose. "This is mine."

"Alright." Also getting up, Gwen went towards the door with her. "But you have to visit from time to time."

"Oh I will." Selina smirked. "You guys do have a pool after all."

The sound of giggling caused them to peek their heads into the kitchen to see Slam entertaining Jessica with magic tricks. Selina smiled and shook her head. Gwen just laughed. Turning around to see the rest of his audience, Slam turned back to finish the trick, which ended with applause from everyone in the room.

"I didn't know you were a fan of children, Slam." Gwen commented, going over to the two of them.

"Got one of my own." Placing a hand on the girl's head to ruffle her hair and Jessica laughed even more. "Reminds me to never take anything for granted."

"It does, doesn't it?" Gwen smiled in understanding.

"Ready?" Standing up, Slam turned to Selina.

"Yep." Selina agreed and waved to the mother and daughter. "See you guys around."

"See you." Gwen nodded her good bye.

The two left the apartment and headed down the stairs. Selina taking a bit of the lead as they made their way to the car.

"So kid," Slam spoke behind her. "You kickin' everyone out of your life?"

"I'm not kicking them out." She sighed. "It's better this way."

"Sounds like your kicking them out." He commented, seeing the car in front of the building.

"It's not like that." Selina assured him, dipping her to get into the vehicle.

"Good," Starting up the car, he added, "because you got a good support group, I'd hate to see you flounder from the loss of it."

"Since when did you become so wise?" A brow lifted in amusement as she looked at him.

"Since I stopped mooning over you." Never one to let anyone off of anything, Slam would not let her get away with his heart but she was a woman that was not going to be put off by that and so Selina just smiled. "But seriously, you got these people that care for you, why are you just letting them walk away?"

"Same reason you let your son walk away." It wasn't a low blow because it was true. The real and simple answer was because it was better for them. "He knows who I am."

"What?" They were driving through the city again. "How?"

"He knows" She swallowed. There was no reason for her to explain who _he_ was, both knew it was the Batman.

"Are you sure?" Slam questioned. "Did he say something?"

"He didn't have to." Selina sighed.

"Are you sure?" He repeated.

"I saw him, the non-cowl version." Having not told the man who the Bat really was, she left it at that. "I could see it in his eyes that he recognized me."

"You let him get too close, Selina." Slam chided.

"Seems to be a pattern with men." She smirked over at Slam who just shook his head at her implication. "Never mean for it to happen but apparently I'm that irresistible."

"I wouldn't go that far." He chuckled and received a light punch from his companion. "You're alright kid."

"Whatever Bradley, I'm not the one that fell for someone that's my son's age." Having gotten over the scorned lover bit of their relationship, Selina was now back in the friend-zone with the older man. Thank god because he was an ex cop, a good cop, and she'd rather be on the good side than the bad.

"Just someone that's your father's age." Slam retorted and then switched. "Be careful with that guy."

"Who?" Her brows narrowed.

"The dark knight." He nodded. They were coming up to their destination again. "Because you know who each other are doesn't mean you're allies."

"I said never we were." As the car parked, Selina felt a small lecture coming on and began to dread every moment of it.

"He doesn't seem like a guy with a sense of humor to let you go again." As they walked to the door, he did so. "And if he gets a chance, he may turn you in."

"You're acting as if we're enemies or something." She pointed out.

"Aren't you?" They had arrived but stood for a moment.

"I see us as working on opposite sides for the same end." Without having to knock, the door swung open and Maggie's frame appeared in the Cathedral's side entrance. "They ready?"

"Yes." Maggie sighed and moved to let them both in. "Karon will need physical therapy and Holly never leaves her side." Another sigh. "They fight all the time."

"And they make up?" Selina guessed smiling to herself.

"Karon can't." Giving her sister a look, she heard a chuckle behind her and she turned her head in the direction of the noise. "Yes, Mr. Bradley?"

"I'm sure they find someway to make up." Still smirking, Slam could not help himself and Selina also continued the smile, thinking the same thing.

Arriving in the area with a somewhat displeased Maggie. The couple was spotted looking anything but unhappy. Holly sat on Karon's bed, while the woman laying down was propped up and content to just look at her girlfriend with loving eyes. They seemed into deep discussion and the three gave them a moment to finish up. Holly's red hair tied up in a pony tail and her blue eyes on the woman below her.

"Selina!" Holly called out, spotting her old friend and bounded over, giving Selina a hug, which she was inclined to return.

"Holly." Pulling back, Selina commented on a good note. "You look great."

"I know." She laughed, leading her over to Karon's spot. "I saw the center upstate and it looks great."

"I thought so too." Never having been one to be the cynic, Selina had to play along with the happy tone of the woman. It usually made her feel better. "Gwen and her family will live pretty close to you guys too."

"That's the best part." Holly sat back down on the bed. "We've always loved Gwen's kids, haven't we?"

"We don't have to go." Karon was not going to let this go.

"You do." Selina told her. "It'll be better for the both of you."

"She's right." Before her girlfriend could say anything else, Holly intercepted. "We have just about everything in need in the back."

"We already brought it to the front." Maggie said kindly. "We also added a few things."

"Thank you." Holly nodded with a smile.

"I guess I'll load everything up then." Slam informed the group.

"This way then." Indicating the route, Maggie let Slam follow her.

"Selina." A new female voice caused Selina to look towards the door and Leslie stood there. She had barely changed in the time that Selina had known her. Always with a bun of gray hair and a pair of blue, kind eyes behind the thin rimmed glasses she always wore. "Can I talk to you for a moment?"

"Yeah." Getting up, Selina went over to the doctor and they began to walk to the section that Selina was least comfortable with. "How is she?"

"She'll be fine." Leslie assured and then turned serious. "I've heard you've been making quite a ruckus lately."

"No more than usual." Selina gazed around the place that many deemed a sanctuary but for her that titled had been lost many years ago. "It's been a while Leslie."

"It has." She agreed, taking a seat in the front pew. "You haven't helped out in the clinic since we moved into the cathedral's old recreational center."

"I didn't think Mr. High and Mighty would appreciate a crook coming into a sacred place." Choosing to lean against the pew, Selina begrudgingly admitted the place was still beautiful. "Might pull your funding."

"And you don't think that he and I have spoken about that?." This woman had been through a lot today and had yet to change out of the scrubs from her rounds. "A little birdy told me that you were at the Falcone safe house."

"A birdy or a bat?" As she glanced around the room, Selina had to make sure that no one else was here. Though she wasn't exactly sure of the relationship that Bruce and Leslie had, Selina knew only a little bit of what Leslie had told her, which was to say, not much.

"You don't need to do this to yourself." Leslie said gently. "It's not worth it."

"I can't let this go, Leslie you know that." Selina sighed.

"Karon is going to be the first of many people that will get hurt that you care about then." Not at all happy with the decision, Leslie was going to let it be known. "If they find out about you then there's nothing holding them back."

"There will be." There was a plan and Selina had to stick to the plan. "Falcone won't be able to get to me anyway."

"They will have more on you than you will on them…" She started. Leslie was not pleased with the arrogance that Selina was displaying, it reminded her too much of another person she knew too well.

"I'm not worried about that." Selina cut in and upon seeing the confused reaction, Selina gave up some of her information. "I'll find someone that can get more on them."

"He's not going to help you." Her head shook.

"He will." The confidence was astounding but Selina had the right to it, sort of. "I have the biggest card of all against him."

"He has others now." Leslie saw the eyes narrow from the other woman. "There's a child…"

"He doesn't have kids."

"No." She assured. "But he now has a boy to look after, he's protecting him because he may be a target for the mob."

Selina stayed silent for a moment to think about her options. Bringing others into this, especially a kid was not what she planned on. However, if the kid might know something if was this supposed point of interest for the mob.

"Why does he think the boy is a target?" Selina questioned.

"Zucco killed the boy's parents and was fighting with the owner of Haly's Circus about money." Leslie added. "The boy was part of that circus, it was his home."

"God," she sighed, "they never stop do they?"

"The mob is getting desperate Selina." Her tone was sad. "They're going to reach out to every avenue within their network."

"I feel like you're implying something." A brow lifted.

"Be careful." Standing, the older woman took the younger's hand. "I'd hate to see what happened to your mother happen to you."

"It won't." Selina shook her head and tried to be comforting. "Maggie is more like mom. They both wonderful women but they can't pull the trigger. I can."

"This Cat-woman persona isn't going to…"

"Catwoman?" It took her out of the moment and Selina smiled. "So they finally came up with a name."

"I wish you would just…"

"I got the lecture from Maggie last time, Leslie." A sigh escaped her. "I don't need to hear it again."

"We're hoping that one day it'll actually take." Deciding that their little talk was over, Leslie began to go towards the back of the cathedral. An arm went around Selina as they slowly walked. "One day, Selina, I am determined to get you to see that there's more to life than running from it."

* * *

**Thanks for reading!**


	7. Chapter 7

"Selina you're late!" Stacy informed as Selina walked in, trying to regain her breath.

"Thanks for letting me know." Selina grabbed her apron and glared at the woman. "Since when does anyone care if I'm late anyway?"

"You have a request." Tom walked in with an order and turned to Selina. "A very big request."

"A request?" A brow lifted and Selina waited for them to tell her what the request was about. "Do we even do those?"

"Selina!" It was Henry who busted into the kitchen and glowered at Selina. "You need to…"

"What table is it?" Cutting off the man with the Napoleon complex, Selina grabbed an extra pad just in case it was a large table.

"Four." Obviously in a hurry, the host, Eddie informed her. "It's one of most important…"

"Who is it?" Selina went to roll her eyes at the others to make fun of the man as they usually did but found them to be unresponsive. "Cobblepot?"

"Bruce Wayne." Henry hissed, clearly not noticing the internal struggle Selina was having at the moment. Sure she had expected him to do something like this but not so soon. Ah, well no better time than the present. "Now get your ass out there and be your gracious self."

Henry hurried her out of the kitchen and Selina felt her heart pump a bit more than usual. She told herself it was more because she was nervous that Wayne was going to rat her out and she would have to make a run for it, not because of his mere presence. As she walked to the table that was requiring her presence, she saw that he was sitting with Thomas Elliot, whose attention was plastered on his iPhone. Of course he was, probably talking to that girl that was here with them last time however many days ago it was. The two were locked in conversation but her eyes remained on Bruce, trying to forget that the other man was sitting there.

Sure, he was by all means devastatingly handsome but he was not the first man to try to make her feel uncomfortable or do whatever he was planning on doing. He was, however, the first to know the full extent of her nighttime activities. Yet she was aware that if he were to expose her that would mean exposing his little operation as well. Thank god for small mercies like that and, as he looked up she saw his smirk. What game was he playing at?

"Mr. Wayne. Mr. Elliot." Letting a smile drop into place, Selina could not let on to how much she did not want to be at the table no matter how good looking the man was. He was often the reason her night fun had to be cut short. "It's so good to see you both back so soon."

"Is it?" Bruce gave her his attention. "I'm glad you think so."

"Are you backed up in there or something?" Tommy questioned. Bruce's face moved for a moment with displeasure. "We haven't even gotten drinks yet."

"Internal problems." Selina was not going to go further into it and wanted to smack the smirk off of Wayne's face as she briefly explained. "I can put something in at the bar, if you want a moment to look over the…"

"Whiskey and soda." Tommy waved. "More whiskey than soda."

"Perfect." Selina's eyes landed back on Bruce. She was being on her best behavior and the urge to smack Bruce quickly went to Tommy. "And you Mr. Wayne?"

"Just a coffee please." He smirked.

"Wonderful. I'll be right…"

"What about an appetizer?" Rudely interrupting her once again, even Bruce had the decency to look mildly embarrassed. Before she could say anything Tommy looked up at her from his phone and a glance of recognition flashed in his eyes. "Wait you're that…"

"I'll be sure to tell Ricky to bring some bread as well." Not needing to hear the rest, Selina swiftly made an exit.

Informing Ricky of the need for bread, Selina had to question why Bruce was doing this. Of all the people he could have possibly brought to lunch with him, why not just a twiggy model that he had been so fond of just nine months ago? Karma was in fact a bitch and it was biting her in the ass right now.

Heading back to the table with the drinks in tow. Selina remembered to at least put a smile on her face. "Here are your drinks, gentlemen."

"So you're the waitress Brucie here wanted to…" Tommy started.

"There's something else." Bruce interrupted, not bothering to give a glance towards Tommy.

"What can I do for you?" Selina gritted through her teeth, trying not to let him see how much she just wanted them to just let her do her job and get paid for it. She needed the money more than they did.

"Dinner." He replied.

"I'm sorry we don't serve dinner until four." Sometimes she really did hate that the rich thought they could get away with such things.

"No," a small chuckle escaped him, "I mean, would you like to have dinner with me?"

"You gotta be kidding me." She could not resist the urge to roll her eyes as if this day couldn't get any worse, it has to just pour this man into the seat to stomp on the dignity she had left.

"So no?" Bruce asked.

"That's a first." Tommy commented, sipping from his drink and watching the back and forth between the two like a tennis match.

"Ask me after you get your check." Not willing to let him off so easily, Selina needed to know and decided that Tommy was no longer part of the conversation.

"Alright." Going for something in his coat pocket, Bruce asked. "May we have the check please?"

"What?" The other man unwilling a spectator of this exhibition sounded.

"The minimum is twenty dollars." She smirked. "Per person."

"Since when?" Tommy had enough of this.

"Since right now." There was no need to be nice and Selina needed to get a better feel for why Bruce Wayne wanted to have a sit down meal with her.

"You can't…"

"I'll have the salmon filet." Bruce cut Tommy off. Apparently he was also done with the playing the entirely nice guy. "And a beef bourguignon."

"I'll have the filet mignon." Tommy grumbled. "Rare."

"Perfect." Pleasantries seeped back into her demeanor and Selina took the already discarded menus. "I'll be right back with your lunch."

Without another word, she slinked away from the table, noticing that it was a normal lunch day and that the two men were the only ones in her section. Strange, considering that there were plenty of other people in the other sections. Damn it, this was going to cut into her wages. Bursting into the kitchen, Selina called out the order and saw that Henry was still there.

"God damn it, Henry!" Selina turned on him immediately. "Why do I have only two people in my section?"

"Mr. Wayne asked not to be disturbed and asked for you specifically." From the look he was giving her, Henry was in no mood for her outburst. "He tips well, you'll be fine."

"Since when do the rich tip well?" She shot back and turned back to the kitchen area, seeing the fresh bread, she decided to take one and chomped down on it. The last actual meal she had was longer than twenty-four hours ago.

"He's pretty good." Whitney walked in with some dirty dishes and decided to join in on the conversation. "His friend sucks though. Elliot is pretty much a douche."

"They are our clients." Henry snatched the piece of bread from Selina and threw it in the nearest garbage. "Have respect."

"They don't respect us." Selina pointed out, taking another piece of fresh bread and hoped that filling her stomach would fill her mind with good thoughts as well as a clear answer for Bruce's question.

If anything that was the most mind boggling of all. Of all people to ask her to dinner, he would not be the first wealthy male but he would be the first wealthy male that dressed up as a bat to fight crime. The Batman. That was what he wanted to talk about. He wanted to understand how she knew it was him and where they would go from there. She obviously was not going to tell anyone since she had her own secrets but why would he want to be seen with someone like her?

The money. He had been presumably knocked unconscious when she had been stealing from the Falcone family, during a quiet get together that she had crashed and she had coughed up some cash for smoke bombs that she thought would knock the area out. Figures that he would have been awake. The goddamned Batman.

"Selina!" The sous-chef called her and she noticed that the food was done. "Your order's up."

"Thanks." She grumbled, placing the plates in a nicely ordered fashion.

"What's got your panties in a twist Kyle?" He smirked over at her. "Wayne not flirting with you?"

"Sounded like he was doing the opposite." Stacy, that sneaky little...

"Last time I take over for you Stacy." Selina informed the woman and left the area before she could do any physical harm.

Taking the food to the table, Selina saw Bruce chatting up Ricky while Thomas sat on the other side, once again, on his phone. Her brows narrowed as she came closer and realized that Bruce was in fact speaking to Ricky in Spanish. The two men speaking laughed, or rather Ricky laughed and Bruce just smiled. Though she didn't really doubt Bruce's intelligence, she had not figured in the different languages bit. It made sense but now it made her wonder how many he knew and how well he knew them. Things could get fairly interesting depending on what his level of expertise.

"Here you go gentlemen." Though the way she said it dripped with a sarcastic twinge to it. "Can I get you anything else?"

"Why don't you sit down with us?" Bruce suggested. Ricky and Selina exchanged looks.

"I'm afraid I can't…" Oh no. This was not how she was planning on spending her day. Speaking in half truths and clipped sentences. Well, this is what she got for being late, again.

"I already asked." Another chair suddenly appeared from Ricky's hands and Selina was forced to sit down. She wasn't sure if she should glare at Ricky or not but she knew that this was not his choice. "Besides I would hate for your salmon to go to waste."

As Ricky left the situation there was a moment of silence and Bruce was the only one that had started his meal. Tommy was looking quite dazed and confused on to what on Earth was going on. The only woman at the table was glaring down at her salmon not enjoying this one bit.

"Tommy was talking about the upcoming Falcone party." Bruce interrupted the silence. "He's thinking of going."

"Uh…" Collecting himself, Selina wasn't sure if it was because he was being forced to sit with her or he was as befuddled by what Bruce had done as she was. Finally he was starting on his meal as well. "Right but it's really on Peyton."

"I thought her family was close with the Falcones?" Oh he was good, really good. Though Selina was unable to actually appreciate his way of doing business at the moment because she was still trying to shake off the dislike for the man right now.

"Not really." Tommy shrugged, taking a bite of his steak. "It was her grandfather that did a few business dealings before the Falcone clan went the other way."

"They've been helping out a lot though." Bruce turned to Selina. "The salmon is really good here, you should have it."

"I'm not hungry." She stated stubbornly and they held each other's gazes for a moment. The tension was palpable no matter how anyone tried to phrase it. In the short amount of time that they had been in contact with another both in and out of the cowls, it was frustrating. She had managed to up him but now, he was the one that had gotten to her and he was showing off. Damn him.

"Did you fill up on the bread?" With a glance down at her black shirt, Selina wiped away the crumbs but was unwilling to give up her displeasure for the situation. "So, have you been to any social events lately, Ms. Kyle?"

"Some." Selina could feel Tommy reacting to her but she chose to ignore it.

"Then perhaps you would be interested in going to this one." Bruce spoke as though he did not have a care in the but she knew the act, she had played this act very well and many times before

"Oh come on, Bruce." Tommy chuckled. "She probably has better things to do that night, like walk Division Street. At least there she could make some cash."

That's when the conversation stopped and the other two stared at him. First they both had an angered expression, which fell into a neutral one. Bruce knew that Tommy was many things, including a womanizer in the day and all around rich prick that he despised but was aware of how many thought of him the same way. This was too far.

Division Street was known for women and some men of a certain persuasion, namely prostitution. Everyone needed to make a living, Bruce also understood that, but this was uncalled for to say the least. Surprisingly Bruce felt the urge to knock the man to the ground, Selina noticed his hands grip the tablecloth next to him, knotting it and they once again caught eyes. What did he care if his so called friend basically just called her a prostitute? That was indeed an interesting tidbit that she stored for later.

"Excuse me, gentlemen." Selina rose. "My beeper is going off and I am being called into the kitchen."

"Of course." Bruce nodded, remembering himself and the grip loosened.

"Oh and Mr. Wayne" turning back, Selina briefly glanced at Tommy before declaring. "Let me know what time you'll pick me up on Thursday."

* * *

Walking through the door to the manor, Bruce noticed that it was once again silent in the manor. Though he had not expected Dick to take to the large space in less than a week, Bruce had expected something. Taking off his suit jacket, Bruce also loosened his necktie. Perhaps he could get some work done in the study before he went out for the night.

"Master Wayne." Alfred's voice caught his attention and the man came forward towards him. His hands were placed outwardly. "I see you are early."

"Surprised?" Bruce smirked, placing the jacket and tie in Alfred's hands.

"Pleased." Then stated the real reason. "Now you can spend some time with our indefinite guest."

"I have to…" There was a look given that only Alfred could pull of and made Bruce sigh and give in. "Where is he?"

"Last time I checked he was in the study." Alfred informed.

"You let him in there?" Bruce's eyes widened.

"He's a curious boy." Apparently Alfred did not see the point in worrying if the boy would figure out how to use the bookshelf, piano or clock, then perhaps he would understand why Bruce was not the most attentive host.

Without another word, Bruce left the area. His demeanor was slightly more put off, but he was determined to put on a happy face for the kid. Seeing the door slightly ajar, Bruce pushed the door the rest of the way and did not see anyone in the room. As he moved further into the room, he heard a distinct sniffle and looked to where he had heard it come from.

"Richard?" Bruce ventured, not believing where he was looking but then again the boy had been trained as an acrobat.

"Don't call me that." From the top part of the incredibly sturdy bookshelves sat Richard Grayson. His knees were pulled up to his chest and his arms wrapped around his knees. "My parents used to call me that when I was in trouble."

"Okay." That was fair, Bruce strained his neck to get a better look. "Hey, why don't you come down from there so we can talk?"

"About what?" Good question.

"How your day was." He shrugged, wanting to be very casual and not wanting to go into interrogation mode on the boy. "Anything you want."

"It was boring." Dick provided.

"What?"

"My day."

"Oh." Bruce thought for a moment and half lied. "Mine too." A pause. "You probably should get down from there."

"Why?"

"It's not safe."

"Why?"

"Because it's really high." Bruce knew where this was going.

"Why?" Dick asked again.

"It's how the builders built it in the later 1800s."

"Why?"

"It was the fashion." Wasn't he just the curious kid?

"Why?"

"I can give you the rest of the lesson if you come down here." Slightly annoyed with the exchange, Bruce knew that he was not much better when he had been younger but he rather had figure things out from his own studies than ask the same continuous question. At least that was how he remembered the past.

"Fine." Moving around a bit, Bruce saw that he was prepared to jump.

"Wait you should just climb…" Before he could finish Dick had made a graceful leap to the ground including two somersaults for a better, slower landing. "Now you're just showing off."

"That's nothing." Finally a crack of a smile or at least a shadow. Dick looked up at Bruce. "You're gone a lot."

"I have work." Bruce shrugged.

"I know." Glancing down for a moment, Dick obviously wanted to ask for something but didn't know how. So he went with the direct path. "Why am I here?"

"So no one will come after you." He explained. "It's safe here."

"Okay." Nodding, he thought for a moment, then questioned again. "But why here?"

"What do you mean?" His brows knitted together.

"Well…" Dick wanted to choose his words better but did not bother to, besides being flowery in his speech had never been his choice and so just said, "it seems that you don't really want me here so why did you volunteer to have me stay here?"

Completely taken aback by this question, Bruce was unsure how to respond. So he came down to Dick's level and looked the kid in the eye. Speaking in a low tone and then he told him. "I'm sorry, Dick, I'm not used to having anyone else here. Most importantly I'm not used to having anyone rely on me."

"Aren't you always out with women?" Dick asked and saw the confused look. "I Googled you to make sure you weren't weird or anything."

"And what do you think?" Bruce smirked.

"Well I think you're just a guy with a past." Dick shrugged. "But others have really strange theories about you."

"Really?" Suddenly intrigued and not that Bruce was completely ignorant of the gossip columns, he was curious what the kid found.

"Yeah." He nodded. "There's a theory that you're the Joker."

"What?" Bruce blanched at that and assured. "I'm not…"

"I know." Dick rushed in. "But another one says that you're Batman and another that the reason you only go to work now is because you're too busy having orgies all the time. Oh and this one said that you're planning on taking over the world with Lex Luthor and Captain Cold."

"That's quite a lot of things." He nodded, deciding that perhaps he needed to let Dick know that he wasn't as insane as either of those men. The others could go ahead and keep talking.

"They're all stupid." Dismissing all of the rumors, Dick waved it away but landed on one. "But I read something about your parents. They were killed too." A heavy silence fell upon the room and finally Dick spoke again. "I'm sorry."

For a moment, Bruce paused but came up with something that might help the situation. "I have an idea. How about tomorrow, during the day, I'll take work off and we'll go do something."

"Really?" Dick questioned and though he didn't smile, his eyes lit up and Bruce noticed how lively they really were and had to smile.

"Sure." Bruce nodded. "We'll go to Robinson Park, it should be nice tomorrow."

"Cool!" It was the first time in a week that the boy actually seemed content with something. Not that Bruce could blame him. Dick had been cooped up in the manor all week. The manor had proved a secure place for the boy and Bruce could see that as Dick asked, "Will it be safe?"

"Dick," Bruce made a promise, "with me you'll always be safe."

* * *

**So moved this over a category. Hope no one minds too much! I'm probably going to move some others over here too. I am glad that you guys seem interested in this. Enjoy!**

**-EV**


	8. Chapter 8

"Then you just move the joystick like this." Pushing the controller down, Bruce was teaching Dick the finer points of remote sailing. "And then any way you want to turn it..."

"This is so awesome!" Dick grasped the control tight and as Bruce let go and straightened up behind the boy, he watched Dick just be enthralled by the simpleness of controlling the sailboat around the pond with the other kids.

As he just chose to let Dick direct the sailboat on top of the water, Bruce just admired the stillness of the space at the moment. Yes there were kids and their caregivers or parents around the water doing the exact same thing they were doing, Bruce rarely saw this side of life. In his head, he was keeping track of things he needed to do later but for now he was going to just let any truly important updates scroll on his phone. In moments where Dick had his back turned, Bruce was grazing the news reports and more superficial cases considering his attention was divided.

"Bruce look!" Getting his attention back, Bruce looked up at Dick's excited little body. "You can make it go really fast!"

"Slow it down, Dick." Bruce chided, tempted to take back the power of the renegade toy sailboat in threat of running into the other kid's boats.

"Hold on." Pulling a maneuver, Dick made the toy do a three-sixty in the water and with that the other parents either looked annoyed or amused at Bruce's expensive as Bruce gave Dick a disapproving look. However, the boy looked far from chastised. "Can I do it again?"

"No." There were a number of nannies chuckling at the answer.

"Why not?" He whined.

"Just watch out for the other boats." Bruce reminded.

Then he glanced across the pond and saw what he assumed to be a father with four kids. They were young, the oldest probably around twelve and the youngest was strapped to the father's chest, no doubt six months or so. As the two middle ones were jumping up and down, excited to get the remote of the boat. The twelve year old had already developed an attitude and stood with her arms crossed and hip jutting out.

The father was attempting to coral the children into an easy to get to space, but the two middle ones were now fighting over one of the controllers, even though the father still had two of them. The oldest refusing to participate and the youngest began to whine and fuss. After a minute, the father finally stood and stated something that Bruce could not hear to which all the children stopped what they were doing, even the oldest had less of an attitude. Without saying anything else he gave the other controller to the older middle child without one and the other to the pre-teen.

With that the children began to play with their sailboats and sped them across the pond. After seeing the children were content, the father went over to the closest bench and sat down. Bruce silently wondered what the man had said to his children.

"Hey Bruce!" Dick caught his attention back. "Do we have sailboats like these at the manor? And pond and stuff like this?"

"We do actually." Bruce smirked, maybe this did not have to be so bad.

This is what he had wanted at one point, he knew that and a part of him still wanted it. Family life. He envied Fox when he spoke of his squabbling family and when he overheard the other employees an invisible string tugged at his heart. Of course this was all stating for lack of better terms, but watching that dad brought that idea back to him very suddenly. Perhaps the addition of Dick made it all the more prevalent.

"Good." Holding up the controller towards Bruce, Dick shrugged. "It ran out of batteries."

Oh right, he was supposed to fix that.

"What do we do next?" Dick's question reminded Bruce that nine-year-old boy's energy rarely ever ran out.

"Let's go for a walk." Bruce located their boat, it was in the middle of the shallow pond. Great.

"A walk?" His uncertainty would have made Bruce laugh but he was currently opening up the controller. "Uh Bruce?"

"Yes?" If he could just find… there. Taking out his third cell phone, which was currently being used as way to get a hold of him for the police department for Dick, Bruce also popped the wires out.

"What are you doing?" Watching in fascination Dick saw Bruce put the two wires together and gave the controller the jolt it needed to call the sailboat back. Dick stared at the boat as it quickly came towards them and then back at Bruce. "Can you teach me that?"

"Maybe one day." Bruce quickly put the dismembered phone back in his pocket and took out a hundred, taking the sailboat with them as they made their way back to the shack.

"What else can you do?"

* * *

Catwoman sat on top of the art museum's roof, leaning against one of the large statues that sat on the façade. In her hands she was toying with a small trinket in her hands that could easily be lifted up into the air. Luckily it was not that windy out and the small object came back into her hands without being taken away from the wind.

When she threw it up and it didn't come back down, she smiled.

"What took you so long?" Her eyes were still on the dark city.

"Why did you trip the museum's alarm system?" The Batman's low voice questioned her, the object still in his hand.

"Well I needed to make sure we were still on for tomorrow night." Finally she turned to him, still letting herself rest comfortably on the ledge of the façade. When he didn't answer, she replied. "I'll take that as a yes."

"Why are you after the Falcone's money?" He asked.

"I thought you would at least wait until dinner." She shrugged. "What else are we going to talk about?"

There was nothing after that and Catwoman sighed.

"You know," Standing, she realized she needed to not be so relaxed around this man even if she did know who he was. "I thought your first question would be how I know who you are or…"

"May twenty third." He rasped.

"And there goes all of the air of mystery about us." Honestly, Catwoman wished she could be more surprised about his knowledge about that. She wasn't going to fool herself but still it would have been nice. However, he did not know the finer details of that night, only she did. "The Falcone's systems aren't secure."

"You know how to get around them." Batman stated.

"I have help." She shrugged.

"The money isn't just for you." He pointed out.

"No." Catwoman agreed with him and she was not going to apologize or even acknowledge the fact that there could have been an apology there. It was useless. Both of them had been in the game this long and knew that people did what they needed to do.

"What did you find out about Falcone?" Though he had his suspicions, Batman needed to hear her side as well.

"Did you read the files I left you?" She questioned right back, coming closer to him.

"Shipments of drugs." There was no need to extend this conversation, longer than it needed to. "Due to arrive at the Gotham Central Terminal at the train station."

"Isn't strange that they didn't specify the drugs in anyway?" Distracted by the moonlight catching the armor for a moment, her eyes flickered to the hard-shell and wondered how much of that was shell and the rest was muscle? Well executed muscle that could… nope another time.

"You don't think they're shipping drugs." She had her goggles pulled back now and in the darkness her usually green eyes were dark, almost black. Still strangely enticing and alive.

"Think about it." Seeing a fleck of dust rolled down his arm, she went to brush it off but his hand caught her. "Don't worry Bats, I'm not going to hurt you."

"What are they shipping?" His hand still gripped her wrist and his voice had hardened. For all intensive purposes she was still a criminal. A highly fascinating criminal, who was not stealing for just personal purposes but for others, the betterment of other in fact.

"They're shipping it in one of the most highly populated areas in the city at rush hour." She stated. "What do you think?"

"A bomb?" He noticed that he was still holding her wrist and so let it drop. Batman had not thought that the mob would have gone that way. Yes they were ruthless but not terrorist in that sense.

"I think they're working with someone." Catwoman added. "This isn't really their MO."

"They're desperate." How much could he share with this woman? True she had his identity figured out but it didn't mean that she was to be his partner in any sense of the word. "What's their next move?"

"Look at your hand." Not having forgotten that his other hand held something, Catwoman nodded towards it.

Opening his hand to reveal what she had been tossing only moments earlier, Batman gazed at the object. It took him a millisecond to figure out what it was. "A surgical knife."

"I was just as surprised as you were." She admitted, only detecting a very small level of intonation in his voice but she would count it. Hell she would count it if he blinked. "It was one of the items that they were importing the other night, thought it might give you something to go off of."

Studying the object for a moment, Batman looked up to see that she was gone but he heard distinctive footsteps and the roof of the museum door swing open. He had to give it to her, she was good.

"Freeze!" A shout of an officer sounded behind him.

As Batman gave a sigh, pocketing the knife, and only turned his head slightly, he noted that there were only four cops up there. They had probably by chance heard the alarm and expected no one to be up here, least of all him.

"I said freeze!" He was nervous. They all were nervous.

Then without a word, he took a leap of faith and hooked himself to the ledge of the museum's roof. Scooting into the corner of the gargoyle, Batman could not believe his luck with this woman. More importantly how he had not seen the officers coming or the fact that she would disappear like that, leaving him for the taking.

Hearing the officers' voices fade, he knew that they really didn't have an interest in him. He glanced down at the pavement below and saw a dark figure scamper across the entrance of the museum and back into the night. Perhaps she was truly that lucky but then why come to him if her luck ran so long? If she was trying to figure this out on her own… she couldn't. If he was being honest with himself, perhaps he couldn't either.

* * *

Crawling through her window, Selina breathed a sigh of relief as she could finally take the cowl off and let her short hair loose. After securing the window, Selina zipped the suit down just a bit in order to get comfortable, throwing the cowl to the side of the living room. Then she made her way to the kitchen and filled a glass of water from the tap. In the moment it didn't matter how terrible the water actually was, all she knew was that it tasted so good right in this moment.

"Fun night?" A low voice caught her attention and her head whipped in the direction of the living room. Her body loosened at seeing Slam on the couch petting Isis.

"Jesus, Slam." Finishing off the glass and refilling it, Selina felt her heart rate slow. "You think you can be a little more creepy?"

"Looks like you're all packed." The boxes around the small apartment made it very apparent.

"Yep." Selina smirked. "Got myself something a little nicer. Moving in tomorrow."

"Heard you got yourself a date tomorrow as well." His tone was far too indifferent from its natural tendency and Selina immediately took notice.

"Good news travels fast." A brow lifted.

"With Bruce Wayne." Slam added, still focused on the animal in his lap.

"Have you come to tell me to be on my best behavior?" She quipped.

"Didn't know you were interested in guys like that." It was a strange line between a statement and a question.

"I'm interested in everyone." Selina smirked, putting the empty glass in the sink and coming around the counter to put herself in the living room half of her small apartment.

"Come on Selina," Finally he looked up at her. "The well manicured, pretty little playboy ain't your type."

"Yeah?" Feeling defensive about the whole thing, Selina questioned. "Who is Slam? You?"

"That's not what I mean and you know it." He grumbled.

"Really?" A brow raised and though she should have been gentler, Selina just did not have it in her right now. "Then who could you possibly mean?"

"I'm just trying to look out for you, Selina." Getting up, he practically threw the cat off his lap, who instantly went over to Selina's side by leaping up onto the counter beside her.

"You don't need to." As she patted the cat, Selina couldn't help but to glare slightly at the man.

"He's a powerful man." He stated. "No matter how much of a fool he acts, Wayne knows what kind of power he has in Gotham."

"I never doubted that." She did not need to be reminded of the lack of status she had in the caste system that was Gotham. In addition she did not need to tip her hand and tell Slam the real reason that Bruce Wayne wanted to meet with someone like her or rather like the two of them.

"He's probably going to want you for a job," it took her a moment to realize what Slam was talking about. "He probably knows what you do and is willing to pay the price for someone like you to knock out one of his competitors."

"Alright Slam." She huffed out an air of amusement.

"I'm being serious Selina." Grabbing her arm, he forced her to look at him. "You've dealt with these kind of guys before and you know yourself that they're no good. The ones with a squeaky clean reputation usually have the most skeletons in their closet."

"What makes you think that I don't already know what's in his closet?" Selina's face remained neutral. Though Slam rarely ever grabbed her, when he did she knew that it was because he thought she was being flippant but in this case she wasn't. She could sooth his fears but really the secret that was the best kept in Gotham was not hers to tell.

"He seems to have a way with the women…"

"Used to."

"What?"

"He used to." Selina correct him. "He hasn't been seen in public with another woman in seven months."

"Just because he hasn't been seen doesn't mean that he's not doing anything in the dark." Slam pointed out, still holding her arm. "Don't be stupid about this, Selina."

"I'm not." She did not need a lecture from anyone especially Slam. Of all the people to do so under these circumstances, god what was the world coming to? Then there was a flicker of light that crossed his hard face and she realized something. Giving a sigh, her free hand went to his face. "I thought we were over this."

"No." Obviously sick of playing the fool, Slam let her in on his secret. "_You're_ over this. I was the one left behind."

"Do you really think that Bruce Wayne is going to turn me on?" The doubtful tone did not deter him from wanting her. "Like you said, too soft."

"You like shiny things Selina," he stated somewhat coldly. "He's the shiniest thing in Gotham, who just saw something he liked in a restaurant."

"If I didn't know any better Slam I'd say you were jealous." Not liking what he was implying, her hand dropped.

"Come on." Slam growled. "You know the moment he gets bored he'll drop you and you'll be back where you started."

"Who says he'll get bored?" A brow lifted and the unfriendliness returned. "Listen Bradley, you said that you could handle this and you said…"

"I never said that!" He shouted and ripped his hand away from her. "You're the one that just thought that we could gone before everything happened."

"This is _not_ my fault." Though she wasn't yelling her voice raised a bit. "I said that I couldn't do that and you just felt like you had to prove me wrong like every other man! It's one dinner thing, Slam, not a fucking engagement!"

"You don't let yourself feel Selina that's the problem!" That struck her a little harder than usual but the other words that followed did a number as well. "You push everyone away just like you did Holly, Karon, Gwen and…"

"That was for their safety!" God, this is what she got for having a couple stands with this man. Men were such idiots sometimes.

"And so they could get out of your way." He informed her. "You put Maggie in that convent so you didn't have to look out for her any more! And…"

"Get out." Selina was done with this.

"You can't…"

But he wasn't able to finish his sentence as Selina grabbed his arm, twisted around his body and slammed him on the kitchen counter. In a low and threatening voice, she whispered in his ear, "Get out Slam."

Without another word, she let him up. He adjusted himself and headed out the door without even a glance back at her. Selina stood there for a moment in the near darkness and thought for a moment. Still feeling the anger in her body, she slammed her palm down on the kitchen counter, creating a dent but not caring. However, her moment did make Isis jump in the air and meow at her.

Looking over at the she let out some air and watched as the cat came over and rubbed her legs. Selina picked up the animals and moved to sit on the couch. Everything that Slam had said had hit her but she knew that no matter how hard she tried she would never fit into that mold of woman. Sure at times she could be easy going or even find herself falling into lust but love… She loved Maggie, Karon, Holly, Gwen, Bill and all of their kids, and even Slam but it was a platonic love that she thought of as mutual. With Slam their time together was brief and necessary. It was more like friends doing a favor for another or at least it was that way for her.

Isis having enough of attention on her, jumped out of Selina's arms and seemed to glare at the woman as she looked back. Merely lifting her brow, as the cat huffed away, Selina sighed. Perhaps all that could change one day or over time. After all she had always been known for changing her mind much like her feline friend did.

* * *

Leaning heavily on her cane, she watched the couple from the window of the large estate house. She saw the sun had set its time in the sky and how the place was calm seeming just for them. It was the way the strawberry-blonde smiled up at her son that she became even more unsure of the other woman. Thomas had always been hers and always would be. This person, other woman, was getting in the way.

"Marla." A voice broke her from the trance and she turned to the rest of the people in the room. Looking around, she spotted the man that had stated her name sitting at the opposite side of the dinner table. "You're making me nervous, please sit down."

"I'll sit down, Mr. Falcone." Marla Elliot's practiced voice from years of trying to perfect the upper class intonation sounded and she slowly made her way to the large table. "When I feel like it, after all it is my house."

"He's just worried about your health, my dear." Oswald Cobblopot's large frame sat closer to her. "As are we all."

"I'm a happy soon to be mother in law to a lovely young woman." Not wanting to break the enjoyment that these people got from such events, Marla looked over to the man that had bred that young woman with her son to be the type of specimen he would want. "From what I hear I'm not alone."

"Don't worry." Carmine sighed. "This won't take away from Ms. Riley's big day."

"When is Louisa's big day by the way?" Oswald questioned.

"In a month." He provided. "But enough about the damn weddings, we need to make sure that everyone is getting their contacts in place."

"Our operatives are standing by." Lucia Viti spoke. "But some have already made some progress."

"Good." Nodding, Falcone looked to the nervous Cobblepot. "What is it Ozzie?"

"Well," as the large man swallowed, the rest fought the urge to roll their eyes. "What if the Batman…"

"He won't get anything of this." Falcone decided to cut in at this point. "The man won't know what hit him until it does and we'll restore Gotham to how it was. A much better time."

"The charities are up and running as well." Sean Riley spoke up finally. "For every dollar we get seventy five."

"Good." Falcone agreed. "And the insurance front?"

"It's…" Taking a moment for herself, Lucia gave it up. "We have a missing salesman."

"Why doesn't that surprise me?" Shaking his head, Falcone was gruff now. "As long as the little prick doesn't give anything up, he can end up in the bottom of the river for all I care."

"The clubs are doing well." Oswald's shaky tenor informed everyone. "We have yet to be intruded on."

"And how is everyone with getting their materials?" Falcone questioned and it became silent. No one wanted to tell the man that his shipments, not much was coming out of it.

"The cargo in the trains has been disturbed many times." The man that spoke up was the quietest of the bunch, his voice soft and glasses rested on the tip of his nose. While one arm rested comfortably on the table, the other was held close to his body, his hand twisted in a mean way. "I think we need to find a new method. Perhaps, Mrs. Elliot's airways would be good."

"We already get our people here that way, Alberto." Telling his son exactly what was the price, Falcone sighed. "We can't use it for everything it would seem too suspicious."

"Yes." He was a younger man, smart, but almost too quiet as if he knew too much. "But this Batman that you seem so keen on destroying cannot fly, at least properly, how would he be able to stop a seven-forty-seven from landing? This would be the safest way to get the rest of the material."

There was a pause in the room and Marla kept her mouth shut, the young man that had just spoken up sat next to her. As a reward, she rubbed her good foot gently along his leg. This would make her a fortune, she could ignore the happy couple out there and see to it that she just needed this. Company. A good boy.

"My son, Alberto, just made an excellent observation." Falcone tilted his head back a bit. "I'm surprised that Marla herself did not make this suggestion."

"Didn't think of it." Marla lied through her teeth but it wasn't the first time and it wouldn't be the last. "But I would be happy to provide. We have some very loyal company members."

"Good." He approved. "We'll discuss this further."

With that Marla and Alberto shared a quick and fleeting glance, which luckily no one saw as they were too fixated on the man at the head of the table speaking. They did not need to verbally communicate with another because they was not how it was for Marla and Alberto, it was more physical than that. Glances and touches were all they needed. It was all they needed to take the reigns from Falcone and put it into their hands.

* * *

**Wooo! I really do love Bruce and Dick bonding time as well. Also, so glad that you guys reviewed and that you seem to enjoy the story. If you never read a story of mine or an author's note, I'm a huge fan of questions, comments or anything of the sort so please drop me a PM or just review. Although all I really want is for you all to enjoy and have fun! **

**-EV**


	9. Chapter 9

"Bruce?" Still gazing at the ties before him, Bruce was not used to this open door policy that had all of a sudden come into effect when Dick and he had gone out the other day. Not that it was incredibly troublesome at the moment but he knew that there were going to be times that Bruce would not want Dick to find particular things out like what he did at night. When he had mentioned it to Alfred, he was unsympathetic in the least. His comment was that Bruce had done it as a child and Alfred saw no reason in ending the tradition in the manor.

Peeking his head through the crack in the door, Dick peered in. Seeing that Bruce was indeed in the room, he bounded in. "What are you doing?"

"Picking out a tie." His attention was still on the ties lying on the bed.

"Are we dressing up for dinner?" Dick questioned, confused with the scenario.

"I'm going out for dinner actually." He replied, finally picking up a purple tie and examining it.

"Oh." With that noise, Bruce was forced to look over at Dick.

"Trust me," giving a smile, Bruce went to reassure him. "You wouldn't want to go."

"Why?" God the kid was curious. "Is it a business meeting?"

"Kind of." Nope, not the purple tie.

"Who's it with?" Dick continued to ask

"Someone that I know."

"Duh." Without even looking, Bruce could hear the rolling of the eyes and it caused him to smirk a bit. "But _who_?"

"This woman that I know." Bruce was stuck picking up a dark blue tie.

"You can't call a date a business meeting." Dick informed Bruce, placing his hands on his hips.

"Who said it was a date?" The blue wasn't working either.

"Come on." Again the exasperated tone and Bruce was beginning to wonder if Dick was spending too much time with Alfred. "You're not willing to talk about it which means you like her…"

"I never said…"

"And," rushing in with the rest, Dick was good with observations apparently. "You're having trouble choosing a tie and you want to look nice which means" he paused for dramatic effect, "you really like her."

"Aren't you supposed to believe that girls have cooties or something?" Bruce questioned seeing that Dick was getting far too much pleasure out of this.

"That when I was like four." Hopping up on the bed, Dick looked down at the ties. "I don't think you should wear any of these."

"So now you're a fashion expert?" Not believing that this kid was giving him a lecture Bruce was happy that he got a smile out of the comment. It was the fourth one Dick had made, after the sailboats Dick had made his first one when he thanked Bruce. His second and third were out of exchanges between Alfred and Dick and now the fourth was just a simple little joke. Nonetheless, it made Bruce feel better and made him smile along as well.

"Well it is your first date in a really long time." Dick pointed out and Bruce gave a puzzled expression. The boy just shrugged. "Google said so."

"Master Bruce." Alfred also poked his head in and saw the ties lying on the bed. "Reorganizing your closet?"

"He's going on a date." Dick answered for his guardian for the time being.

"Oh?" Giving his a very interested look, Bruce just gave an inaudible sigh.

"Didn't you know?" Dick asked.

"I didn't." Alfred was only slightly surprised but highly intrigued with the new development.

"Really? Glad I'm not the only one." Looking to Bruce, Dick added. "You must _really, really_ like her if you didn't tell Alfred."

"Master Richard." Feeling as though he needed to cut in, Alfred told the boy. "I left some of my batter out."

"Can I have some?" Immediately the boy jumped up and seemed to get even more excited when Alfred bent down.

"If you hurry." He informed the boy before Dick raced out of the room and to his new found excitement. Straightening the two men watched Dick leave, then Bruce went to put some cologne on and Alfred also turned. "I suspect you're not in need of a ride then."

"I'll be fine." Bruce assured.

"Even if something comes up?" Alfred saw a minor shrug and then went out on a limb for a guess of who it was. "I suspect that this woman knows who you are which is why you will not be needing my assistance in driving her back to the hotel, alone."

"It's fine." The all too casual attitude as Bruce put on the suit jacket without the tie and the first two buttons undone, Alfred assessed the younger man. "What?"

"You always have to go for the most difficult of women don't you?" Shaking his head, Alfred was about to leave the room before he stated. "It's seven o'clock and you were supposed to pick her up at seven fifteen."

Selina dabbed some more concealer on the bruise across her right cheek, pleased that it was now completely covered up to those who didn't know it was there. After last night she had sought out some idiotic muggers preying on some poor blond and jumped them. Unfortunately one had managed to get a hit with the butt of his gun on her face. Perhaps she needed that kick in the face to remind herself that no matter how hard she covered up those bruises and scars it would never be enough because she could always see them.

Hearing the buzzer of her new apartment ring, her brow furrowed and she did one last check over in the full length mirror before hurrying over to the door to answer it. Opening the door she spotted a finely suited Bruce Wayne on the other side, a small smile playing on his lips but it soon straightened out at her appearance.

"Security was supposed to call me when you arrived." Selina commented. "I pay extra for them to do that."

"They know me here." He shrugged, then as a man, he looked her over. "You look stunning."

"They know you?" A brow lifted. "I shouldn't be concerned about getting jumped by some leggy supermodel should I?"

"The Foxes live here during the week." Bruce informed and then saw her puzzled façade. "He's CEO of Wayne Enterprises. You should do better research Ms. Kyle."

"Please." She let out a light chuckle. "That's what I have you for." Grabbing her clutch from the side table and her light jacket, Selina questioned. "Ready?"

Moving out of the way, he let her pass him and lock her door with a simple twist of her key. Then with something born within him, he took her coat and helped her into it.

"My what a gentleman." Selina quipped as the jacket slid on her arms. Tying the belt securely around her waist. They began to walk down the hallway. "I take it you had a decent day."

"Small talk?" His brows lifted in surprise.

"Polite conversation." She corrected as they entered into the elevator. "Besides I don't think you would want anyone overhearing what we should be discussing anyway."

"It was a good day." He relented for the time being. "Nothing very new."

"Besides the fact that the Viti's arrived yesterday." The doors swung open before he could retort and they walked in silence to the awaiting car. Giving a side glance, Selina commented. "I like your car."

He didn't bother to say anything and just gave her a look to which she just stepped into the car once he opened the door for her. Noticing the stares that she was receiving from the valet attendants Bruce was quick to give a notice to the younger men and they immediately looked away. Then he went around the car and felt the strange pang in his chest, he was nervous. However, he pushed that feeling down and got in.

"So are we actually going to eat," Selina asked as the vehicle began to move out of the driveway, "or is this all a ploy to turn me in?"

"You wouldn't have come if you actually thought that." He replied.

"But it would be prefect wouldn't it?" Now she was just teasing him. Leaning her head on the headrest, while she gazed at him. From the corner of his eye he could take in her long neck completely unburdened by her short, dark hair. Her eyes perfectly lined and the green irises stuck out amongst the make-up that she had on. Her red lips taunted him like they always did. "You could just drop me off at the station create that you caught me trying to steal something at the manor. It would be so simple."

"You're lucky then." Bruce would be damned if he let her get the best of him, all the time. "I'm not a simple man."

To that she did not say anything but laughed. He couldn't help but give a little smirk. But he did enjoy hearing that sound. Her laugh was lithe but nice to listen to. It wasn't forced but actually sincere. Honestly, it had been a while since someone had truly laughed at his sarcasm or jokes. It had been a long time since he made them. This was nice to hear from a woman, especially from her.

"So Bruce," Drawing out his name a bit Selina let herself savor the small clench she saw him make, "what kind of man are you then? A difficult man? A civil man? The completely glib playboy they make you out to be?"

"Depends on who you ask." Bruce turned into the close restaurant. "But like you, I like to keep people guessing."

"Even yourself?" They paused before the stopped car's doors swung open and they were able to leave the confined space.

As he came around, he caught up with her and with the lightest touch put his hand on the small of her back to lead her into the darkened restaurant. Through his fingertips Bruce could feel the tightening of the muscles, telling him that she did not trust him, despite all the visual signs that she did.

"Mr. Wayne." The hostess smiled to him and nodded to Selina. "Ms. Kyle, let me take your coat and follow me please."

With her lips upturned, Selina noted that Bruce was indeed trying to pull out all the stops. She knew that he had informed the others of who she was and knew the exact reasons why he had wanted to do so. It also did not escape her notice that his hand had yet to leave her back and that he had gotten closer to her as they moved through the restaurant and towards the back. Going through a glass doorway, they were ushered on an outdoor balcony, overlooking the darkened city. Despite the brisk air as it was still turning into summer, it was warm there and their table was set back far enough that the winds from the water wouldn't bring in the chill that threatened to take over.

The step up was very nicely and conducive to what they would be discussing. The table sat in the middle, away from the glass railing, an extra table of bread and flowers, sat on the left. Surprisingly enough an expensive champagne bottle sat in ice, next to the table. Candles were lit on the table and the lights were dimmed within the balcony space. Selina noted that this was probably not the first time he had gone to these lengths to get information, which was to say that she was impressed.

"Your first course will be out in ten minutes." The hostess decided to explain as the two milled about the space. "It will be our oyster special, followed by a lobster bisque. The first plate will be a our special alfredo dish and then the dinner special of the night of lamb with a side dish of asparagus. For desert we have a dark chocolate mouse and chocolate covered strawberries."

"What?" Selina raised a brow. "No chips and salsa?"

"Thank you." Bruce translated for the hostess.

"If you need anything the buzzer is next to the roses." She informed and left, feeling her presence was no longer needed.

"My, my, my, Mr. Wayne." Making her way to the railing, she only gazed back for a moment. "You sure do know how show off."

"Would you…" Indicating the champagne bottle, Selina turned to him and Bruce lifted the bottle from the ice.

"Only if you have one." She knew his dislike for alcohol. It was one of the first things she had commented on when she basically gave her position away that night. However, he surprised her by pouring two glasses. "And you're drinking? I feel like we're celebrating." Taking the glass from him as he came over to her. "Or you're just giving me the illusion that we can tell each other everything. Making me feel comfortable with enough to tell you everything I know."

"Well when you put it that way." Mimicking her lean, with her back on the railing, facing in, he took his stance beside her and looked at her. "What do you know?"

"Just about as much as you at this point." Selina shrugged. "I think they're going to make some moves at the wedding in a couple weeks."

"What kind of moves?" He had similar suspicions but he wanted her end.

"They'll try to get backers upfront rather than the backend of things." Turning around her eyes gazed at the city. "The guest list is quite long for that wedding, including some very prominent Gothamites."

"And the supplies?" Knowing that she was having a hand in some of the disappearance of various materials, he had to know.

"If you mean who's taking the supplies," she inquired. "You should see my closets."

"I thought you would've sold it." He commented.

"I don't want it to get back into the mob's hands. The bit that I have been selling has been going to different places." Selina shrugged. Looking out to the city, she switched the conversation elsewhere. "From up here, the city is really beautiful, quiet even."

Watching her face, Bruce kept silent. He knew that she was trying to get something out. Perhaps not information that they were supposed to be talking about but this was her own way of letting him in a bit and he was going to accept that. Taking a moment, he saw the sharp angles in her face, pointed chin, high cheekbones, and a sharp nose. Yet her facial structure was even more pronounced with the hairstyle she kept. It was shorter, shorter than many women kept it.

"People are so ignorant, so confident that nothing will ever happen to them." She continued. "And you let them think that."

"They don't have to worry." His brow narrowed.

"They still do." Selina told him. "They think you're a murderer right now. That you killed Dent and all those other people."

"And you think differently?" This was something he had expected them to finally touch on.

"I used to see Gordon's wife when I worked at this diner they used to go to." Selina sighed. "There was a report that came on the TV about the Dent Act. She got up and went in the back, he followed her and their conversation was… interesting."

"What did they say?" Instantly curious, Bruce couldn't help himself.

"Don't worry they kept their voices down and I was the only one that heard them." She assured him. "But they did talk about how Dent wasn't so good after all." A pause happened. "I'm not asking for the story, Dent was never my favorite person anyway."

There was a sound of the opening of the door and their first course came through it, along with a very happy batch of waiters setting the table accordingly. As the table became even more presentable, the two went over and sat down after they were done. The waiters left and they were alone again.

"You seem to know a lot of background on people." Bruce let her take the first oyster and then he took one.

"When I plan to do business with people, I want to know all about them." Taking a bite of the shell animal, Selina savored the taste.

"Business? With Gordon?"

"I assume that since I planned on speaking with you that he would come along soon enough." Selina shrugged. "Rumor has it that you two were close at one point." At seeing his face, she added. "Maybe not any more." Selina continued. "I take it that you have only given me the same courtesy."

"What I could find." He nodded.

"Let's have it then."

"You have a GED and got into Gotham University on a full ride but never finished," Bruce indulged her. "You've had arrests in thirty two states, fifty countries, broke out of Elizabeth Kane Memorial Women's Correctional Residence at seventeen."

"Well this certainly beats the whole getting to know you phase." She acknowledged. "So we know what we need to know about another, what's next?"

The next course was brought and they both waited until they were once again alone.

"Why are you interested in Falcone?" Picking up his spoon, Bruce had wanted to know the answer to this a very long time ago. Her insight to the Falcone Family was precise and good. In a sense, it bothered him.

"He's of interest to everyone." Tasting the soup, Selina noted that it was almost better than the oysters.

He remained silent and just gazed at her.

Selina relent a bit of her own information. "I've had some past dealings with the mob and I would prefer if I didn't have to deal with them again."

"It's a free ticket out."

"My favorite kind." She smirked, taking a sip of her soup.

"Your sister," Bruce saw that he had struck a chord when she faltered for a moment, "Does she approve?"

"She never had a choice to do so." Selina informed him. "And she still doesn't." There was a pause then Selina went into deeper territory. "The boy, does he like the idea of living with… _you_?"

"He doesn't know." Not liking that she knew about Dick, Bruce felt his eyes narrow slightly at the idea of even her hurting the child. "He's not apart of this."

"You leave my people alone, I'll leave yours." They had a stare down for a moment before their soup was taken away and on to the first course.

After another moment of silence, the waiters nodded their leave and again the couple was alone. They began to eat in silence. There was an unwritten code of not going too far and leaving things how they were. But there was more that each wanted to say to another though there wasn't an exact reason why.

"I guess this means we're in agreement." Selina was the first to break and Bruce looked up for an explanation. "Each of us have people that we can't touch and we both have stakes if the mob were to come out of the shadows again. Neither of us can do this alone."

"I could…"

"You can't." She interrupted him. "There are some things that you are not willing to do and I am."

Bruce stopped himself from saying anything else and considered the consequences of this. Should he feel a need to align himself with a known criminal? There was a large part of him that said that he couldn't but the other part knew better. In reality, the people of Gotham saw Batman not much better than they saw this cat burglar. They saw him worse in fact.

Seeing his conflict end a bit, Selina raised her untouched glass of champagne. "To partnership."

Against the skyline of the city, the two glasses clinked together and the two people on the balcony sipped their first taste of champagne in years.

Dick sighed heavily as he lay on his stomach on the comfortable bed. In front of him lay the tablet that he had found in the study the other day and Alfred informed him that he could have. Without needing any more prompting, Dick eagerly took the device and got to work.

So while Bruce was out with whoever he had a crush on, Dick was deep in the database of online records of people, or rather, person of a particular interest to him. Dick already knew that getting actual information on the man would be difficult as he only knew the name. However, he had been lucky that Anthony Zucco was a somewhat man about town before getting married. The newspapers had chronicled some of his going outs with Carmine Falcone and later Sal Maroni. A brief mention of Zucco opening his own insurance shop and Dick's mind flooded back to the conversation in the tent.

Though he didn't know much about how the mob handled things, as a somewhat curious and rumbustious child, he was highly cognizant of warnings. His parents' deaths were warnings to Haly. However, Zucco seemed to disappear as of late. It was only a matter of time before he slipped up though and Dick knew that he would. Plus there was something about a Falcone wedding coming up and there was no way that Zucco was going to miss a relative's wedding.

"Master Richard?" A brief knock on the door before it opened to reveal Alfred coming in. "What on earth are you doing up this late?"

"Couldn't sleep." Closing out of the various websites, Dick looked up to see the older man coming towards. "What are you doing up this late?"

"Waiting for Master Bruce to come home from his outing." Alfred smiled.

"Is he going to go out after again?" Dick sat himself up.

"What do you mean?" Despite what he felt on the inside, Alfred continued to remain collected as he spoke to the boy.

"Well…" He hesitated, "I was exploring after you guys went to bed and I saw Bruce still dressed coming from the study. I didn't see him that night at dinner."

"I must've taken dinner to the study then." Alfred replied. "He's been working very hard these last few months."

"But I didn't hear him come in all day, even before dinner." Dick shrugged. "Just thought it was weird because I heard him come home all those other times."

"Master Bruce can be quite stealthy at times when he wants to be." This child was fairly astute and Alfred was now wondering how long it took before Dick found out the truth. The boy was obviously not going anywhere any time soon so it could not take that much longer. "How about you ready for bed? It's much too late for someone your age to be up."

"Five more minutes?" Doing the best puppy eyes that he could, Dick managed to hear a door close in the large manor. Immediately he jumped up. "He's home!"

"Wait!" Alfred tried to stop the small athlete from meeting his older charge, but he slipped past his grasp. "He's not…"

Racing through the hallways, Dick bounded down the stairs to see a very surprised looking Bruce Wayne standing at the bottom. Bruce's eyes widened at Dick's arrival.

"Why are you still up?" Bruce questioned.

"Couldn't sleep." His rushed speech, made Bruce think he wanted something. "How was your date?"

"Fine." Putting a hand on the kid's shoulder, he began to lead up back up the stairs.

"Wait!" Dick pushed back against the force that the older male had but it wasn't working. "I need to tell you something!"  
"Tell me while you get ready for bed." Though Bruce had never thought of himself as someone who cared when children went to bed, he found that he in fact did care that Dick went to bed at a decent hour so he wouldn't be cranky in the morning. One cranky male under forty was enough.

"Okay," Dick started, "so you know the guy that killed my parents." Bruce stopped completely in the hallway and turned to him. Seeing that he now had the full attention, Dick rushed. "He's related to that mob family… F… Fal…What is it?"

"Falcone." Dumbly Bruce provided the name.

"Right." He nodded. "Anyway, there's a wedding and I think Zucco will go. We could get him!"

"What do you mean?" His brows narrowed, unsure of where this was going or how Dick got this information.

"Well you saw him fighting with Haly that night too and if we give our accounts then it would be enough to place him under suspicion and the police could arrest him for that." Dick's eyes were wide with excitement and even Alfred had caught up to the two but remained quiet.

It was impressive to say the least, but Bruce knew the drive underneath this type of speech and though he wanted to do more and had thought something of similar lines, there was the fact that it was the mob. They had their own rules when it came to playing with authority. Plus Zucco wasn't just any son, he was Lou Maroni's son and Carmine's nephew who had been second to Maroni a couple months ago but toppled when the Joker had reeked havoc on Gotham.

"Dick." Getting down on the same level with the boy, Bruce began to explain slowly. "Zucco is part of the mob and the police won't break up a Falcone event unless they have a large amount of evidence to do so."

"So he's guilty!" He protested.

"I know." Bruce nodded. "But there's more to this than you think there is."

"Tony Zucco killed my parents!" Though he had been a wealth of knowledge earlier, Dick succumbed to his baser youthful self. It was not a bad thing and Bruce understood completely.

"I know." He repeated. "We can't…"

"He deserves to go to jail!" Tears began to steam up in his eyes. "I just want him to go to jail!"

"Nothing else?" It was a strange prompt that even Alfred cocked his head at.

"I don't want him to die." Dick's eyes narrowed. "He deserves to think about what he did and I want to watch him rot in jail!"

"This isn't our call Dick." Bruce needed to remain calm but he understood the pain so well. However, he had wanted to watch Joe Chill die and was willing to do it himself. This aversion to the idea of killing after seeing what Dick had seen was interesting to say in the least. "We have to let the police do the…"

"What about Batman?" The crumbled face subsided for a moment and brightened a bit. "He could find him!

"Do you know how to get a hold of him?" He teased and saw Dick sigh. Tousling Dick's hair, Bruce stood. "Come on it's late. Go to bed and in the morning you can tell me how you found out all this information."

Wiping his eyes on his sleeve, Dick let himself be led by Bruce to his bedroom. They passed Alfred, who silently followed them. As they got to the room, Dick entered while Bruce and Alfred stayed on the outside of the doorway. Bruce watched as Dick entered the bathroom and began to brush his teeth.

"I take it your outing was productive." Alfred asked.

"It was." Bruce agreed and paused before saying. "He's smart, really smart."

"Quite like another boy I used to know." He nodded. "He noticed your late arrival the other night. It's only a matter of time before he pieces everything together."

"She knows about him." His voice had gotten quiet.

"Everyone in Gotham knows about Master Dick." Though he hated to burden the man more, Alfred couldn't help the truth. "You don't think she would…"

"No. It's not part of our agreement." Bruce stated quickly. "But others might."

"He will be fine." He informed. "I'm more worried about when he wants to go out there with you on your nightly escapades."

"He won't." Turning, Alfred could see the fierceness that he believed such. "Besides I already have someone else working with me and that's enough."

"Oh?" Alfred questioned. "Should I ready an extra plate for breakfast tomorrow?"

"Nothing like that." Bruce grumbled and glared when Alfred just gave him a knowing look. "Don't."

"I didn't say anything." Alfred shrugged. "But please leave some sort of sign that I may add to the breakfast table in the mornings. Perhaps a sock on the door?"


End file.
